Export to separate pages PDF with prefix

[Steve Kelly]

Hi Wonder if anyone can help me with a page numbering question on exporting to pdf. I see in the latest version indesign CC18 that we can now export to separate page pdfs which i thought would be great, but it only seems to add page numbers as a suffix.

Is there any way to do this with the page number as a prefix in a 3 digit format?

I want to achieve the following

001_myfilename.pdf

002_myfilename.pdf

etc

Ive included the screenshot of where i am currently looking

Many thanks

Steve

[JonathanArias]

you could do this from acrobat, see attached. go to organized pages, split, and in that dialog option you get several options as how you can slit and call each file.

[Steve Kelly]

Hi Johnathan, thanks for the advice. Yep, i could also do it with 'better rename' app, but i was hoping to do it in indesign. Adobe have gone to the effort of adding this feature, but i imagine one of its main uses would be for people supplying press ready pdf files which most printers need with the page number at the front. Maybe they'll add it for the next version

Thanks again

[BobLevine]

You can do a batch rename in Bridge.

“Most printers” don’t need separate PDFs.

[Steve Kelly]

Hi Bob,

Thanks for that, yep im aware I can do it outside of Indesign, ill just leave it as a request for an option in any further release.

My experience, with two of the biggest web printers in both the UK and US and working on 100+ page magazines for over 20 years is that I am always requested for separate files, especially when I am soft proofing on Kodak and Agfa pre-press systems. Smaller documents, I agree, but never my experience on web and and 100 + docs.

Thanks for the input though

[JonathanArias · Accepted solution]

you need to go to the request features page for requesting something. this is a forum ran by volunteers that help answer questions.

here:

Feature Request/Bug Report Form

[Steve Kelly]

Thanks Jonathan, ill do that. Thanks to both you and Bob regardless

[Laubender]

Hi Steve,

you can add your voice on a feature request I did yesterday about Suffix input.
Your suggestion could be perhaps termed "Prefix", I think 🙂

Enhance the new Suffix feature for exporting single Pages or single Spreads as PDF – Adobe InDesign ...

Regards,
Uwe

[Steve Kelly]

Hi Uwe,

Yep i just requested the feature and also voted for yours, thanks for the advice.

[Laubender]

Thanks.
To make all things more flexible I could imagine a parameter like:

^FileName

So one would be able to move around file names at will.

Hehe, the most flexible way would be to allow a Regular Expression to tailor the file name 🙂

Perhaps just like the example below where the first 7 characters of the base file name should be used:

^FileName{ match( /^\.{7}/ ) }

( But that's just wishful thinking… , wheras a tool like MadeToPrint is able to do something like that. )

Thank you very much for your suggestion.
It really makes sense!

Regards,
Uwe

[Jongware]

Looking at the options Acrobat offers in  JonathanArias​​'s post, I feel that dialog could be copied straight into InDesign. At a glance those are the ones usually requested.

I imagine Acrobat did not have those extended options until users specifically asked for them. One wonders why InDesign's engineers could not have taken that hint right away.

[JonathanArias]

Agree. every year  i get a project where i have to do a data merge of certificates. Its 50000 plus  files that have to be individually name. it would be great if you can name them based on the text on a specific style too.  The certificates i do have serial numbers and they want each .pdf to have the serial number in the file name.  I make a TOC and have it split based on top level bookmarks from that dialog box.

[Pete5D64]

theres a script that will rename each pdf file with data from your csv/text database https://colecandoo.com/scripts/

[JamT2000]

I've been wondering about this too. As we supply pdfs to printers too and they always want separated files. We actually use our editorial management system to rename the files for us to a prescribed format per magazine title. Fingers crossed for a prefix option, although it's still not in 2021...

[JamT2000]

addendum: I've been playing with 2021 & finder rename on the Mac & have it as I would like it (YMMV):

my export pdf dialogue has 'use InDesign document Name' set to off, the Save As: field is my desired file name syntax with a trailing underscore eg. MAG_ISSUE_.pdf

in preset window I set the range or all for the pdfs I need, under create separate pdfs my suffix is just ^P

this is close, once the pdfs are all created I select all & 'right click' for Rename X items and use Format with Name format: Name and index

Where: Before name

Format: eg. _MAG_ISSUE

Start Numbers at eg. 01

finsl result is spot on. I don't need the initial detailed file naming at export but it keeps it clean & obvious.

hope it helps

(I could do with a way to prevent the enclosing folder being created...)