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October 25, 2023
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Inserting tabs around a bold section with grep

  • October 25, 2023
  • 3 replies
  • 573 views

I'm moving a list of 2500 exhibitions from word to excel, splitting the info into columns with tabs. The gallery names are in bold so I thought I could save time by pasting it into indd and using a grep find and replace to insert tabs before and after the bold text. But I don't know how. Can you help?

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    Correct answer James Gifford—NitroPress

    Why not do this in Word, before the export? Find allows a search for bold, and a simple macro could be used to combine that and insert of a tab. Pulling it into ID is... unnecessarily complicated, I think.

     

    This just worked for me on a test doc:

    • FIND (empty string), Font->Bold
    • REPLACE WITH: ^t^&^t

     

    This found every bolded word or word group and put tabs at each end. The only messy bit was if the group included a paragraph return. (And a simple F/R would fix all those in a second pass.)

    3 replies

    James Gifford—NitroPress
    James Gifford—NitroPressCorrect answer
    Legend
    October 25, 2023

    Why not do this in Word, before the export? Find allows a search for bold, and a simple macro could be used to combine that and insert of a tab. Pulling it into ID is... unnecessarily complicated, I think.

     

    This just worked for me on a test doc:

    • FIND (empty string), Font->Bold
    • REPLACE WITH: ^t^&^t

     

    This found every bolded word or word group and put tabs at each end. The only messy bit was if the group included a paragraph return. (And a simple F/R would fix all those in a second pass.)

      P
      PicSyncAuthor
      Participating Frequently
      October 26, 2023

      Hello James,

      I think "^&" should be my first tatoo (in Arial or TNR).

      No need for indesign after all.

      I've been using Word for 20+ years and I'm ashamed to say this is the first time I've used the FindWhatText wildcard.

      Thank you so much.

      Chris

      Robert at ID-Tasker
      Robert at ID-Tasker
      Legend
      October 26, 2023

      You should mark "as correct" replies of others - that you think are helpful - not yours. 

       

      Peter Spier
      Community Expert
      Peter SpierCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      October 25, 2023

      Find: .+ and set the find format to bold

      Change: \t$0\t and you can set a change format if you want to change it, but it isn't necessary.

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        PicSyncAuthor
        Participating Frequently
        October 26, 2023

        Hello Peter,

        Tried it, it works. That's exactly what I was looking for.

        Much appreciated.

        best regards,

        Chris

        Mike Witherell
        Community Expert
        Mike WitherellCommunity Expert
        Community Expert
        October 25, 2023

        Why not use the split feature in Excel?

        Mike Witherell
          P
          PicSyncAuthor
          Participating Frequently
          October 26, 2023

          Hello Mike,

          Thanks for the response.

          Apologies, forgot to mention I'm using Word and Excel 2010, using delimiters and text-to-columns in excel.

          Are you refering to the new functions in Excel 365? (TEXTSPLIT, TEXTBEFORE, TEXTAFTER.)

          From a quick google they also seem to depend on characters for the split, not formatting.

          Am I barking up the wrong tree here?

          Chris

          p.s. I daresay there's a way in VBA but I'm looking for a simpler way before having to go down that path.

          p.p.s James' answer below is spot-on with how to get it done in Word (even 2010), but I'm still curious about your Excel suggestion if you have the time to respond.

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