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T
tarasm68924948
Participant
October 17, 2017
Question

Have to lock inactive layers to select objects on active layer in InDesign

  • October 17, 2017
  • 1 reply
  • 556 views

I'm having this problem in InDesign CS6 and it's probably in CS2017 too. A document has several unlocked layers. If I'm editing an object on a current active layer and click on another layer to make it active in order to edit an object on this layer, it wouldn't allow me to select this new object. I'm still editing the old object (on the previous layer) even another layer is made active. I have to lock all layers except for the new active layer and then I can select and edit a new object. It's very inconvenient as I have to constantly lock and unlock layers to edit objects on different layers. Is there a way to fix it?

Thank you.

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    1 reply

    amaarora
    amaarora
    Inspiring
    October 18, 2017

    Hi,

    That is a designed behaviour. Are your objects stacked on top of each other?

    If yes, then ctrl(or cmd)+click will select the next object down in the stack of the same layer.

    -Aman

    T
    tarasm68924948Author
    Participant
    October 18, 2017

    Thank you. I work with multipage documents with many layers and the objects are not stacked on top of each other. Is there a reason for such designed behavior? The meaning of an active layer doesn't seem to have any value because you can't select objects on it unless you lock other layers and it makes your work a lot more tiresome. It would be nice if Adobe could change this behavior.

    amaarora
    amaarora
    Inspiring
    October 18, 2017

    Hi,

    well i would say for reason such as flexibility and more control.

    If i understand correctly, what you want is that if layer "red" is selected in layers panel then one will only be able to select objects on layer "red" even if the user clicks on objects of layer "blue"? This will hold true even if layer red is locked?

    -Aman

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