'Even' and 'odd' pages from consecutive files in an InDesign book will not combine on a spread when exporting to PDF

[nancyh45036145]

When exporting a book with multiple InDesign files to PDF the last 'even' page from document 'x' needs to combine with the first 'odd' page of the next document on a spread.

So let's say document 1 is from page 1-6 and document 2 is from page 7 to page 50, pages 6 and 7 need to merge onto a spread when exporting to PDF. It will now make separate pages, while the pages from one and the same document do come out as spreads.

[Randy Hagan]

A couple things I might try ...

1) Your new documents might have Start Section checked in your Numbering and Section Options dialog box. When combining a book, InDesign recognizes that and respects as you compile your book. The funny thing is, if you open that dialog box by selecting the Layout>Numbering and Section Options... menu command, it automatically checks that box upon opening. So checking this makes it happen. You'll have to ensure that you're not starting a new section when you open the relevant file(s).

2) As a last resort, combine the PDF files in Acrobat and print from there. This isn't preferable when InDesign should do that automatically. When other options fail, sometimes working your way past the problem pays off because it'll take longer to figure out the cause.

Hopefully others here will offer more information if this doesn't help. There are a lot of really sharp people here.

Good luck,

Randy

[IndigoDaisies]

Did you manage to get a fix for this?

[SJRiegel]

In most cases, it is not necessary, and may even be counterproductive to export a document as spreads. The takes each set of two InDesign pages and turns it into one Acrobat page. For most purposes, view options give the look without changing the Go to Page options in Acrobat. It remains as single pages, but views as spreads.
  

[IndigoDaisies]

Thank you for responding, I am aware of changing the view but when I'm sending around for internal proofing it would be handy to have reader spreads as sadly not everyone uses Acrobat Reader as default and other PDF readers don't honour the acrobat's lovely view settings.

[Jongware]

If this is so your users add annotations, then you cannot import them into your InDesign document if exported as spreads. (... I *think*; but I'd be surprised if they could actually do such a trick.)

A better solution is to send a bug report to the creators of that software which does not honor PDF settings.

You could also remind your colleagues that the Acrobat Reader is free, available for a large number of platforms, and, unlike unreliable viewers such as most web-based browsers and Apple Preview, is a totally conforming viewer up to date with the latest version of the PDF specifications.

[MariamH87]

I am not sure if you resolved the problem, but make sure you do not have "spreads" clicked. You should export as pages with the setting "Two-Up (cover page) .. then the chapters and pages should properly align.