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A
Applepeople
Inspiring
June 13, 2020
Answered

Placing text from Word -text doesn’t show

  • June 13, 2020
  • 2 replies
  • 3647 views

InDesign - current version. 
When I try to place a Word doc, I see the cursor is loaded and when I try to place it I see a frame is made - but I cannot see the text. I can even see there is the plus indicating there is more text to flow. Why isn't the text showing? I've done this before with no problem! I looked at text wrap, text color, arranged objects. But I'm placing on a brand new document. What the heck!? This has really ruined my day!

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Correct answer Laubender

Hi Applepeople,

just to add something to Randy's very good advice:

In case the Word document contains images it could be that a placed image frame will block the text that comes after the image frame. This could happen if the image frame is larger than the InDesign text frame you place the Word document.

 

Two workarounds for this:

[1] Do a huge text frame on the pastebaord and try to place the Word document to that frame.

If successful change the size of the blocking image frame.

[2] Remove the images in the Word document before placing in InDesign.

Do that with a duplicate of the Word file.

 

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

2 replies

L
Community Expert
LaubenderCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
June 15, 2020

Hi Applepeople,

just to add something to Randy's very good advice:

In case the Word document contains images it could be that a placed image frame will block the text that comes after the image frame. This could happen if the image frame is larger than the InDesign text frame you place the Word document.

 

Two workarounds for this:

[1] Do a huge text frame on the pastebaord and try to place the Word document to that frame.

If successful change the size of the blocking image frame.

[2] Remove the images in the Word document before placing in InDesign.

Do that with a duplicate of the Word file.

 

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

A
ApplepeopleAuthor
Inspiring
June 21, 2020

Thank you, Randy and Uwe!

Between the two of you I was able to figure it out. Using Story Editor confirmed the copy was there. Showing hidden characters in ID didn't reveal paragraph marks or anything. But when I did a delete, my copy appeared. So, maybe it was an image, like Uwe said.
You both saved me who knows how many hours of more struggle. Thanks!

Randy Hagan
Community Expert
Randy HaganCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 13, 2020

Let me ask a couple of things of you:

 

  1. When you place the text and click into the text frame, then press Cmd+A, the keyboard shortcut for Edit>Select All menu command. (You are using a Mac, right?), do you see lines of highlighted text crossing the width of the text frame? Or just little black boxes along the left side of the frame?
  2. With that text all highlighted, If you select Cmd+Y, the keyboard shortcut for Edit>Edit in Story Editor menu command. When the Story Editor box opens, do you see your text just like you did when opening the MSWord .doc/.docx file?

 

If you see the text highlighted all the way across the text frame, and you see the copy in the Story Editor window, you likely have a problem with the text formatting within InDesign. Giving it a new paragraph style with a color of [Black] should alleviate the problem. If you don't see the text highlighted all the way across the text frame, and you don't see copy in the Story Editor box, you have an importing filter problem. To get yourself past the issue quickly, go back to MSWord and save the copy as a Rich Text Format (.RTF) file, then place the .rtf file. That should, hopefully, import your copy with your text formatting intact.

 

Hope this helps. Good luck.

 

Randy

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