Tracking Down a Mysterious Linked Text File

Mike Rankin

Here’s a great InDesign mystery involving an unknown linked text file. It was solved and sent in by Melise Gerber. Here’s her story:

I opened a file, and it showed an out-of-date .txt file in the Links panel, with no location.

I tried searching through my document, and on my pasteboard, etc., and it didn’t exist. I also didn’t have the option to unlink the file.

I found this forum post, and decided to try the suggestion to relink the file and then unlink it.

But I didn’t have any files called Additional Project Summaries.txt, so I created an empty .txt file, named it Additional Project Summaries.txt, and then tried to update the link in the Links panel. I then got an error message that stated that the new file I was trying to link to was not a usable data source.

That was the clue I needed! I opened the Data Merge window, and sure enough, Additional Project Summaries.txt was listed as the Data Source, and there were five fields listed.

I chose Remove Data Source and voila, my list of links no longer included the mystery file.

Also, the Preflight panel did not show an error message, even though there was a missing link. I have actually used this particular file a number of times, and never realized there was a missing link until I opened it with the Links panel open.