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• • February 10, 2011 at 1:58 pm #58697
    Olaf Nelson

    Member

    I thought I'd seen something about this, once upon a time, but can't find it now.

    I'm wondering if it's possible to find out when a given style in a given document was last defined and compare that with the same info for the same style in a different file. I thought the style comparison feature in Blatner Tools might do it, but after reading a bunch of descriptions and sales pitches, I'm still not sure if this is one of the things it compares. Haven't bought BT yet, though I will soon.

    It would be cool if when I clicked the double-arrow-synchronize button on the book panel ID would warn me that style X in file N is in danger of being overwritten by an older version and ask if it's OK (like it does when synchronization will cause text become overset in certain files, or when I want to save a file with the same name as an existing file).

    Or if the whole sync process had the option to use the newest version of each style as the source, regardless of which document it's in. Could cause nightmares with styles based on other styles, perhaps, but not if you're pretty conscientious about keeping everything equivalent.

    While I am careful about this, I'm always paranoid that I might have solved some little problem with a character style in chapter 4, failed to sync that style in all the other chapters, then synchronized all the styles in the book with another file as the style source, wiping out the change in chapter 4 and not realizing it until it's too late.

    Best option of all (for me anyway) would be to have styles that apply to a whole book (or a chosen subset of files within a book). When I do a book, I set it up so that every file has the same styles, and try to avoid having styles that exist in only one file or some files. I would LOVE it if I could check a box in the style definition that says “Make this a book style” and then have it move from the document's list of styles to the book's list of styles. Change it in any document and it changes in all documents instantly.

    This seems so obvious that I now think something similar must exist in some form and I've either forgotten it or am just oblivious. Must be a plug-in for this, right?

    Thanks.

  • February 10, 2011 at 3:22 pm #58700
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    Olaf, that's an interesting idea. I don't know of any way to determine the date when a style was last changed. Unfortunately, Blatner Tools doesn't do that. I hope you'll find the BT suite useful anyway, though.

  • February 12, 2011 at 4:41 pm #58713
    Olaf Nelson

    Member

    On the subject of book styles or whatever they should be called (which idea, if no plugin exist for it yet, I'd be happy to sell for a reasonably exorbitant rate!), there could be a choice in the style definition dialog asking “Should this change affect all files in the book or only this file?” OR, there could be a list of the book's files and the option to put a check mark by the ones that should share the change to the style. OR, as I said in the first post, above, groups of files within a book could be designated as style groups, which all share a set of styles and whenever a style is changed in one file the same change happens to the rest of the files in the group (perhaps with the question I mentioned.

    And as long as I'm designing my wish-fulfilling plugin or feature set, let me add that master pages, swatches and every kind of style (character, paragraph, object, cell, etc.) could also be included in this.

    Another benefit to having styles and such housed in some sort of master list outside the files was revealed to my annoyed self today when I had to go through a bunch of files and delete dozens of swatches and a few defunct styles from each one. Couldn't just select all unused and delete them, because there were many that weren't in use but might be used. And of course the swatches weren't named anything intelligible. It was a pain. If there was just one list that applied to all the files in the book, it would have taken less time and been less annoying.

    I should stop daydreaming and get back to work on the book in question. Or quickly learn how to write plugins, create this one, and then have dinner.

  • February 12, 2011 at 4:44 pm #58714
    Alan Gilbertson

    Participant

    A very inexpensive safety net is GridIron Flow. It will automatically save versions as files are overwritten so that you can revert (pretty much instantly — we're not talking about restoring from a backup) to an earlier version any time. Visual versioning is a life saver, and a bonus is that you can make any saved version the current one just by a click, open it and re-sync. Flow has other advantages in a design workflow, but that one feature has saved my bacon (and a great deal of time) more than once.

  • February 13, 2011 at 6:40 am #58716
    Olaf Nelson

    Member

    Flow sounds like a good idea, but not sure how it relates to what I'm wishing for here.

    I had another thought/gripe/wish regarding styles and books: I want template files to be includable in books, or at least able to be tied to the book styles/swatches/masters. Perhaps a 2nd class of files within a book file: non-published. Templates, mockups, etc. Files you want to be consistent with the book in terms of styles and such, but which aren't to be part of the actual publication.

    A book I'm currently working on is not completely written, so I'm getting new chapters all the time. Sometimes there's some new wrinkle in a chapter that requires a change in the design or in a style, or the addition of a new style. I want that change applied to all future chapters and all past chapters. For the past chapters, I can often achieve it by synchronizing in the book panel, but for future chapters it needs to be in the template file. To do that, I have to load styles, load master pages, etc. Again, paranoid that I'll forget to do it after some small change.

    I'm still using CS3 (CS5 is here, as is a new computer to run it on, but haven't had time to set it up and move files over), so maybe I don't know that templates can be included in books now. Can they?

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