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• • December 7, 2012 at 11:45 pm #63707
    Gert Verrept

    Member

    Is it possible to update only the page numbers of a TOC? We often have to work with docs which have a TOC made for first reading, but the title text is partly changed in the body of the doc (for better reading), but not in the TOC. So, the content and the layout of the TOC is correct, but the page numbers aren't. I've been looking around but I didn't find a solution, execept the “update TOC”. This means we have to start allover each time changes are made. Unfortunately, making the TOC in a later stage isn't really an option for various reasons, we tried making “invisible” textframes for the changed titles, but this takes up a lot of time.

    All idea's, scripts or links are welcome.

    g

  • December 10, 2012 at 6:46 am #63709
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    I can't think of any clever solution immediately. Maybe something with conditional text? Or perhaps put the changed text in an opaque frame above the actual TOC, so you cannot see the “real” toc text, but can see the numbers?

  • December 10, 2012 at 7:41 am #63712
    Zita Major

    Member

    I'm working on instructions for users on a daily basis. Every languages has a title in the body text but in TOC we use another expression.

    • I've created text frames that contain the TOC expressions (with an applied paragraph style that is used in TOC),
    • anchored them to the language title in the body text
    • then hid them.

    This way I could change the language title to whatever I want to (in the body), the TOC text would remain the same meanwhile the page numbers update correctly when updating TOC after pages are added or deleted.

    I haven't found any better solutions yet, but this works fine for us. And with keyboard shortcuts you can easily hide/show the anchored textboxes as well.

  • December 10, 2012 at 8:43 am #63713
    Theunis De Jong

    Member

    If I suspect the contents are not going to be adjusted but page numbers might, I replace the generated page numbers with Cross References. Then it's just a case of keeping an eye on the occasional chapter title correction, because they will need to be repeated in the TOC as well.

    Once I ventured into inserting the entire chapter title as 'cross references' in the TOC but that didn't lead to the expected result (“easier to maintain”) but rather the opposite.

  • December 10, 2012 at 9:35 am #63715
    Betty Taylor

    Member

    I use the workaround of putting the correct-for-the-TOC text on the pasteboard. As long as the text frame touches the edge of the page (and text is styled with the correct paragraph style) it will show in the TOC.

    I like this technique better than using invisible text because, well, I can see it and the TOC text and the page chapter head text are next to each other: if the page chapter head text is changed, it's easy to remember to change the TOC text.

    Disadvantage? Need to move the frame if text reflows to another page. I suppose I could anchor the text frame.

  • December 10, 2012 at 1:10 pm #63716
    Gert Verrept

    Member

    As I thought, Indesign and TOC, not a happy marriage.

    I think I'm going to try the Cross reference option. Wait and see.

    Thnkx for the replies.

  • December 10, 2012 at 3:37 pm #63717
    Zita Major

    Member

    Just a thought about invisible textframes: if you won't change it in the future and you anchored it to the right place you don't really have to see them in the document and when you show hidden characters you can see the anchor character so you know it's still there. But of course this solution is only working perfectly for us because it's the same in every document and I don't need to change any of the texts.

    I wish it would be easier. Maybe in next version of InDesign. But I have to admit I still love this software a lot, no matter how hard it can be to solve some things that normally seem to be quite easy and evident.

    Work in Word a bit and you'll be happy to get back to InDesign again.

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