Data merge in InDesign

[Mark Schnegg]

Hello,

I am working on updating a catalog which contains photos of products and a short information block. I am trying to set up the system so a non-expert can move around objects (containing 3 graphics, and the descriptive paragraph) when the catalog is produced periodically. It has the same layout, but the items are in different places in each iteration. I have moved each piece into it's own linked object with a fixed link name based on page and grid location (a,b,c...). An administrative person can choose the 3 graphics (2 of which are photos) and the descriptive text from a folder of items and copy and rename them with the object names.My intent is that whan all the items have been defined, when InDesign is opened and all the links updated, the new content inthe layout will dynamically be assembled. It all works more or less except the graphic (AI) and the photos are not being automatically set to fill frame with content. Is there a way for me to make this work correctly? It seems like the fill function is tied to a specific link item rather tha the space it is allocated in. Currently each graphic item has to be selected manually and set to the  fill frame wicth content. Since there are many items some which overlap others, it is a process nearly as bad as manually ungrouping, selecting each element, relinking them and then regrouping. The overlapped items though are nearly impossibe to easily update this way though since the order gets all messed up and each item needs to be moves to the pastboard, updated and then the all have to be moved back into place with the correct stacking. It currently takes a couple of weeks of work to do an update. Any help would be appreciated! Would a plugin make this easier?

Thanks

Mark

[Peter Spier]

Sems like this ought to work if you create and assign an Object Style to those frames that includes the fillting options. Have you tried that?