I have CS, CS2, CS3 and CS4 installed on my machine. Unlike you, I have clients who only have CS2 (for example) and so documents from them that need me to work on them need to be opened in the appropriate version. Thank heavens (or whoever) for Rorohiko’s Soxy. It makes opening the appropriate version very simple. I have no connection with Rorohiko other than being a satisfied customer.

I did find at one stage, when I needed to replace my hard drive and so needed to reinstall all sorts of things, that CS4 needed to have CS3 already there, CS3 needed to have CS2 and so on. Each had been purchased as an upgrade and so needed to have either the actual software on board or, alternatively, the serial number. I’m just glad I hung onto the original packages! It is something to bear in mind when you are contemplating deleting stuff from your hard drive.

So far, so good, but lately I have struck a frustrating problem and have no idea what to do about it . . .

When I try to launch CS2, it asks me for my serial number. When I type in the serial number (copied carefully and accurately from the original DVD cover) it rejects it as an invalid serial number. Aaargh! Where do I go from here? Because I don’t live in the USA, to contact Adobe (even if I dial the local number for Adobe) I must do it during USA West Coast business hours. For me that means at some awful hour in the middle of the night!

But, until I get it sorted, I can’t do any work for clients tat are still using CS2. So why don’t they upgrade? I guess for the same reason that I haven’t yet upgraded to CS5 — it costs more to upgrade than it is (currently) worth to me.

Or you could use a rule (above or below) and adjust its thickness and offset to where you want it. If you then made a character style of that, you could simply select the text and apply the character style.

I usually create my first file (for a chapter) with just two or three empty pages. I make sure it has the margins, columns etc., that I want and then the paragraph and character styles that I want. All of these can be modified down the track but, by trying to get as many as possible of these features set up in the initial file, I save myself a lot of work later.

Often I don’t even put text blocks on the actual pages, though if I am going to have a regular feature to text layout (like the text block for the first page of each chapter beginning further down the page than usual) I may put in a text block, perhaps filled with placeholder text and, in that case, I may thread the text onto subsequent pages. But no real content at tis stage.

If the finished job is to have more than one master page, I set these up in that initial file as well, complete with page footers and headers and page numbers, plus, of course, any text variables that will be on master pages, insofar as I know them at this early stage.

Then I copy that file (still with no real content) as many times as I will have chapters in the final book, giving each one an appropriate name (probably not chapter numbers, as someone’s good advice above — forgotten who, sorry! — suggested). I may even make one extra that I can use a template for any additional chapters that may need to be created as the design progresses.

I open a new ID book and load all of the individual files (except that possible extra one) in as chapters. The book will only have a limited number of pages at this stage (number of chapters multiplied by number of pages in initial file) but, as each chapter is filled with content and pages added as necessary, InDesign looks after the page numbering in each file and, of course, the chapters can be shuffled as needed.

Naturally there will be a need from time to time to add or modify paragraph and character styles but, provided this is done on the file that is used as a style reference by the rest of the book, that is no great hassle.

I have been using the book feature of InDesign for a few years (though not nearly as frequently as some of you) and am still discovering all its capabilities.