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• • January 3, 2013 at 3:34 pm #63849
    CynicalKiddo

    Participant

    Once a year for a few months for the past five years, I work on a large product catalog. Each year after completion, I archive the most recently completed catalog on a server along with all related files and wipe it from my local hard drive. The following year I copy the last year's book file and spreads back (no other links) to my hard drive, rename the book file and relink all spreads on my local HD to the newly named book file. To reiterate, the working book file for the current year is linked to one set of spreads only located on my local HD. There is only ever one version of a spread that the book file can link to on my HD. If a spread were to be removed from the HD, the book file would flag that spread as missing.

    For the first time this year I completed the catalog in InDesign CS6. I have been an InDesign user since its infancy and have used all version leading up to CS6 throughout my career. The issue I am about to explain has occurred sparingly in other versions of CS and was fortunately noticed through very careful proofreading and fixed before sending any projects to print.

    The issue is:

    Saved file changes “impossibly” self-revert to previous file save rounds: a change can be made on round 2 of changes, remain changed for round 2-6 and revert to round 1 at round 7.

    We keep meticulous printouts of each round of catalog changes that the client was able to refer to in order to discover this after the catalog had been printed and it was noticed that changes made were not reflected in the printed piece.

    This occurred on several spreads at different times throughout the rounds leading to final files.

    I have read through forums and see that this has happened to other ID users. How can we be assured this issues will be fixed and when? What kind of explanation can I provide my client?

  • January 3, 2013 at 6:46 pm #63850
    Tom Pardy

    Member

    I have no clear explanation but am wondering if you are using a Macintosh and, if so, if you are using Time Machine as an automatic backup. I have not had a problem with InDesign but, just occasionally, I have made a change to a file (specifically to Contacts) and, when next I open that file, find that the change has disappeared. I suspect some bug in the Macintosh system has replaced my file from the Time Machine backup files.

    I would love to discover that this is not the case but that is the only possible explanation that has occurred to me. I wonder if it is happening for you — or for anyone else? And, if it is not the explanation, what is?

    Then, of course, I want to know how to solve it!

  • January 4, 2013 at 7:02 am #63852
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    I have heard people talk about this problem occassionally over the years, but I remain convinced that it is either a system type problem (like Furry noted) or (I'm sorry to say) user error. There is no way an InDesign document can revert itself; InDesign documents don't save earlier versions.

    That said, the part of this story that jumps out at me is the fact that it's a book file with links to other files. Book files don't get saved until you specifically save them or quit InDesign. I'd be nervous that it was linking to the wrong file or something.

  • January 7, 2013 at 8:38 am #63877
    CynicalKiddo

    Participant

    @Furry, yes, I am working on a Mac and using TimeMachine as an automatic backup. Your theory is interesting and has me wondering if this is the case. Like I said, there is no other files for the book to link to (which, @David, is why I'm positive this mystery is not human error).

  • February 26, 2016 at 8:00 am #82292
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    @DavidBlatner I am currently converting 18,000 Quark pages in to Indesign. (that is all going fine and dandy) I am running into a problem where the Book is linking to the wrong file path. So when we have a new “release” (bi monthly) we copy our files over to a new file folder with a different name. With that said the Indesign Book is still saving to the old “month” file path.
    Example: I copied February 2016 and pasted it in April 2016 and the file path is still hooked to the February Book.

    Hoping there’s a solutions to this problem, as I have to leave Quark world Fast!

    • March 1, 2016 at 11:46 am #82441
      Peggy Meyer

      Member

      What you are describing, Jeannie, is how InDesign works when it comes to copying to another location. I have a lot of trouble with this as well, since I reuse the same document/book files for subsequent issues of our documentation. I’d love to copy/rename/re-purpose, but I’m scared of destroying what InDesign treats as the “master”. Can someone give us a good explanation of what is going on? I take it that “linking” is the feature we don’t understand. Thanks!

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