Cross Reference to a Text Inset

[doug1120]

Chapter 5 contains a text inset.  Chapter 7 contains a cross reference link to content in that text inset.  When I create a PDF, clicking the link in Chapter 7 does not make the Chapter 5 text inset display.  Is there a way to fix this?

Thanks!

[Bob_Niland]

What version and patch level of FM?

How are you generating the PDF (save-as, publish, print-to-PDF or print-to-Ps&distill)?

What are your output settings, in particular Generate Acrobat Data?

What you want to do appears to work in FM7, by the way.

[doug1120]

FM 2017, 14.0.4.511     I use File > Save As PDF.

When I click Update Book the Chapter 7 link displays in the book error report as "Unresolved Cross Reference", so it's probably not a PDF problem.  But if I open Chapter 7 in Frame and double-click the link, it prompts me to open the source file, and upon doing so it displays the source file with the destination easily visible.

If the XRef is unresolved, why does it work in Frame?  If it's resolved, why does it fail in PDF?

Thanks,

Doug

[LinSims]

If you want to have an xref to a specific spot within the text inset, you have to create a marker in the original file and then have your xref link to the marker. There's information in the Adobe help documents on how to do this.

Insert cross-references

Scroll down until you see Insert a cross-reference to a Cross-Ref marker in a document

and follow the directions there.

[doug1120]

I was linking to a paragraph format; I'll try linking to a marker.  Thanks!

[LinSims]

That works with a text inset when you're linking to the document that contains the original text that you are then using as an inset. That's in the section just above the one I originally referred you to, and it's possible that section (Insert cross-reference to a paragraph in a text inset) will actually be more useful. In fact, I think that's the section I meant to send you to, originally. Sorry about that.

[doug1120]

Thanks everyone.  It looks like I can Xref from Chapter 7 to the text inset inside Chapter 5 as long as I select Chapter 5 in the Document: field on the Cross-Reference dialog.  I had be specifying the text inset there instead.  I hadn't realized that all of the Xref markers (and paragraph formats) in the text inset would also be listed as part of the parent chapter file's markers and formats. 

However, this still doesn't work if I want to Xref from the Chapter 5 parent to content inside the text inset.  Strange.  Fortunately I don't need to do that, at least not today. 

[LinSims]

You have to have the document your text inset was created in, before it became a text inset, open.

Your choices then, if I read the directions correctly, are:

• Create an xref directly from, say, chapter 7 to the paragraph in the document that the text inset was created in, but you run the risk of losing the reference if the document the text inset was created in is updated (NOTE: This means that if you are using the text inset in chapter 5, you do NOT create the xref to chapter 5, you create it to the document the text inset is in.)
• Opening the document the text inset was created in and creating an xref marker to the paragraph you want to link to within the document holding the text inset, deleting the xref (but not the marker) in the document holding the text inset, then linking to the xref MARKER from chapter 7, or chapter 5.

[Matt S - Tech Comm Tools]

You may have trouble with xrefs in text insets...If needed, consider reorganizing your content to avoid them.

Just sayin'

-Matt