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• • December 3, 2019 at 3:31 pm #1200882
    Olaf Nelson

    Member

    I routinely have projects with dozens of paragraph and character styles, and there are often numerous styles with similar names. Since I can’t use keyboard shortcuts on a laptop without a number pad, I have to click on them in the panel. When there are several first paragraph styles, several body paragraph styles, etc., I have to pay close attention to make sure I click the right one.
    It’s even worse in the character style or paragraph style dropdowns at the top of the screen–they just seem harder to distinguish visually.

    I’ve started doing something to make the ones I need most often stand out immediately:
    (Pretend this is the paragraph styles panel)

    chapter title
    chapter number
    drop cap para
    odd header
    even header
    page number
    F I R S T para (no indent)
    . 1st para -10/99%
    . 1st para +10/101%
    B O D Y para
    . body para -10/99%
    . body para +10/101%
    A – H E A D
    . A-head no space before
    B – H E A D
    . B-head no space before
    N U M B E R E D list
    . lettered sub-list
    B U L L E T list
    . other bullet list
    B L O C K quote
    . block quote indented para
    F O O T N O T E
    1st para bold to colon
    unnumbered para in numbered list

    It might be hard to see here, but what I’m doing is adding a space between each letter in the main word(s) of a style name, like B O D Y. It really helps in the panels and dropdowns, especially on a laptop screen where all text is pretty small. The extra spaces make those items stand out instantly. I’m not sure if I like the dot-space-space-space-space method of indicating sub-versions of styles, which I just started doing today, but so far so good.
    Wish I could attach a screen shot.

  • December 3, 2019 at 3:45 pm #14323635
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    Two things:
    I encourage you to learn how to use Quick Apply for applying styles. It’s awesome!
    Also, InDesign 2020 offers the ability to use other keyboard shortcuts for styles (though you have to avoid shortcuts that are currently in use by the app)

  • December 3, 2019 at 7:28 pm #14323630
    Olaf Nelson

    Member

    I’ve been using quick apply pretty much as long as it’s existed in ID. It’s great when you’re applying the same style repeatedly. The problem with it, in my opinion, comes when you’re applying lots of different styles to an imported document. Since you can’t select non-contiguous chunks of text, I don’t feel like you save any annoyance or time when you have to type something into the quick apply dialog (even if it’s just 1 or 2 characters) every time you want to quickly apply.
    I’m happy that 2020 allows more shortcuts, though.
    Even with both of those options, it’s often necessary to use the style panels and dropdowns, and when it’s a complicated document with tons of styles it can be hard to spot the ones you want.

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