Index Problem in Indesign

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
April 19, 2025
6 replies
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Hello all. I've created an index for a 90 page document. It updates and generates a new index with no problem, but when I place the index in my document, it only goes to 'S' and there is still room in that space to be filled and shows that there is overset text. When I click on the overset text box, and place it in the next column, only the next 'S' entry appears. What the heck is happening and how do I fix this? Thanks in advance!

How to

Correct answer Ingrid27213032z9is

Barb, You're the bomb! I did the edit, select all, and then the enable, then disable No Break. The rest of the index magically appeared. Thank you so much for your help!! I really, really appreciate it!

Barb Binder

Community Expert

Ingrid! That's great news. Come back and see us next time you get stuck.

~Barb

~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training

Barb Binder

Community Expert

You know what, Ingrid? You would get the same results if you have non-breaking spaces between the page numbers, no character styles assigned and hypenation off.

Look for ^s or ^S after the page numbers and replace with a space.

.

Everything looks normal until you enable Type > Show Hidden Characters and then the ^ appears indicating a non- breaking space. This is why we both asked to see them.

~Barb

~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training

Barb Binder

Community Expert

So Ingrid, can you try what you saw me do? Click in the Index with the Type tool, choose Edit > Select all, and enable then disable No break. (Be sure it is off—no check mark and no dash.) Does the content come back?

If not, could you please enable Type > Show Hidden Characters and re-share the same image you shared earlier, along with a picture of the Generate Index dialog box. Honestly, it doesn't matter if you use your phone to take the pics or take an actual screenshots. We are just looking for the clues we need to help you solve this. The content is there, so this is solvable.

If you are in a hurry, you can also share the index file so that we can just look it over.

~Bar

~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training

I

Ingrid27213032z9isAuthorCorrect answer

Participant

Barb, You're the bomb! I did the edit, select all, and then the enable, then disable No Break. The rest of the index magically appeared. Thank you so much for your help!! I really, really appreciate it!

C

Colorful_Ocean4771

Participant

Yes, Same issue.

Robert at ID-Tasker

Legend

@Colorful_Ocean4771

Can you check if you've ANY CharStyle active on the CharStyles pallet - when you create / update index?

Barb Binder

Community Expert

Hi Ingrid:

See how all of these numbers move to the next line?

That looks to me like the numbers are set to not break across columns, and that would cause the exact issue you are showing us.

Now, you would know if you were adding it manually like I just did, so perhaps you are inadvertently adding it with a character style in the Generate Index dialog box? Try changing the Page Number character style to None and update the index.