A couple questions about identifying and updating linked items

[Thomas_Calvin]

I encountered a couple of unexpected problems when placing linked content in my document.

First, "Place and Link" creates an identically-named object in the document, with no indication that it's linked to anything. There's no symbol next to it in the layer list to indicate a dependency, and not even "(linked)" appended to its name. Do you seriously have to rename every instance of the item manually, in order to track dependencies?

Second, I can't find any option to update the linked instances automatically when the parent changes. Isn't automatic revision the primary reason for linking? Sometimes a tiny yellow triangle will appear on an instance of the item when the parent changes (but this is not at all reliable), or you'll see an "error" indicated in the status bar if you look. Then you have to manually trigger an update. Must you really baby-sit every change?

Thanks for any insight.

[Thomas_Calvin]

Where is the Edit button for posts here? I forgot to add a screen shot.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Click on them and then check in the Links panel - not in Layers. 

There will also be an icon telling you which link is up-to-date and which one are outdated - or missing. 

[Thomas_Calvin]

Thanks! I have looked in this list. I guess the only way to reliably find the master entity is to right-click on a link and say "Go to source."

I'm still mystified that we have to continually baby-sit every instance of linked content. And because there's no indication of linkage in the layer list (and the linked instances are individually editable), it will be easy for another team member working on the document later to unknowingly edit a linked instance and then have to either break the link or lose his changes. Or is there some way to prevent this that isn't apparent?

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

A bit different topic - but maybe will help you a bit: 

https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign-discussions/i-am-baffled-by-the-quot-content-collector-quot/...