Curiouser and curiouser. I now know why ID does not respect cropping data when you paste an image from one frame to another.

From the Department of What Were They Thinking: When I query the geometric bounds of an image I’ve selected with the Direct Selection tool, the list of properties returned (y1, x1, y2, x2) defines the position of the uncropped image relative to the dimensions of the page, not to the frame that contains it.

To make it possible to copy/paste from one frame to another and preserve the positioning data, it appears one must coerce the coordinates so they now refer to the equivalent position relative to the location of the target frame on the page.

I suppose one could derive the difference between the geometric bounds of the image and the geometric bounds of the frame, and then attempt to position a pasted copy of the graphic at the same relative location in the target frame.

What rocket scientist decided to make the positioning relative to the page? No wonder this is so danged difficult. In QXP, you’re scripting the position of the image in the box, not relative to the page, which makes it really easy to copy/paste and preserve positioning.

I’m ready for my headache now, Mr. DeMille. 8-(

Thanks for the vote, David! The suggestion’s up to a count of 6 as I write this.

And just to prove that yes, this suggestion is worth it: This afternoon, I had to rearrange two spreads of images (for a total of 40), shuffling them from straight alphabetical to alphabetical by location. My wrist is killing me.

And it turns out my tale of woe has a happy ending after all.

Last night, I remembered that some years ago, I installed ID CS4 to access the trial version so I could access a document that I otherwise could not open.

Turns out I not only patched the demo, I kept the patch files.

Woohoo. Sometimes it works out.