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• • August 22, 2016 at 12:38 am #87681
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    **TL;DR:**
    I’m asking if anyone knows how to show on InDesign file one table field that represents “Category” and under that all other table entries that have that same “category”?

    **Details:**
    I have to create catalog with InDesign, right now I’m stuck with data merge but I’m open for any other way to do this. Situation is next:

    I have spreadsheet with informations formated like this:
    https://i.stack.imgur.com/2BfIx.png

    And my InDesign file should show like this:

    View post on imgur.com

    What differs my question and my project is that under categories I have subcategories but I’m thinking if I manage to figure out how to handle categories I could do the same for SUBs.

    Thank you in advance!
    Daniel

  • August 22, 2016 at 6:15 am #87687
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    You’re either going to need to do a lot of work in Excel first (setting up all that data, maybe with lookup tables and such), or you’ll need to use a commercial database publishing system (data linker? easy catalog?). Either way, note that data merge cannot do tables by itself, though there is a script that can help:
    https://creativepro.com/using-data-merge-to-create-a-table-for-a-directory.php

  • August 22, 2016 at 7:23 am #87704
    Mike Wenzloff

    Member

    Your data is easy to import and be formatted as per your sample using a data merge plug-in such as the one I use from EmData called InData (I use the version for QXP, XData but they do the same thing). One writes what is called a prototype and InData uses that to merge the data into the text frame. It can be made to only repeat certain information, such as your CLASS only once, etc.

    Download the trial if interested. It is limited to X number of records in the Excel file, but it should let you see how well it works. If you need help with the prototype, I can write it for you and Em Data is great at their customer support and likely would help as well.

    I would recommend, from a design perspective, to use bullets or numbering not both.

  • August 22, 2016 at 1:12 pm #87710
    Mike Wenzloff

    Member

    Well, if I could edit my post above…

    It’s Em Software for the company name.

  • August 22, 2016 at 1:22 pm #87711
    Mike Wenzloff

    Member

    Here’s a couple screen shots. First is the prototype used to create the merged file:

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/eolhzwh4n6pp9f4/capture-000141.png?dl=0

    Next is the merged result:

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/wnq9xovx7s8pkhs/capture-000142.png?dl=0

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