Hi @Rogerio5C09 I had a look at your sample documents, but I'm not sure that cross references are right for your situation. I think they will fight you the whole time because of the trouble with cross-references and master pages.
I had another idea. What if you set up your master pages using "Button Passive" Object Styles for the buttons and then, on the actual pages, (a) overrode the current page's button and (b) applied a "Button Active" object style to it, which could also include paragraph styling to turn the text white.
Then, whenever the master page text content changes—and of course the active button text content did not update because it was overridden—you could run the below script, which will synchronise them. I've configured the script to attempt to synchronize any text in "Contents Active" paragraph style if it is in a text frame that was overridden.
Have a look at the attached demo.indd to see how I've set it up. Compared to your sample document I've just applied two paragraph styles to the text and two object styles to the "buttons". Which you should do anyway, even without the script! 🙂
- Mark
/**
* @file Update Overridden Master Texts.js
*
* Synchronizes contents of specified styled paragraphs
* if they have been overridden from a master page.
*
* @author m1b
* @version 2025-04-23
* @discussion https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign-discussions/find-text-by-formatting-and-insert-cross-references-to-paragraph-text-in-a-master-page/m-p/15283426
*/
function main() {
var settings = {
/** any text found in these styles will have their contents synchronized */
targetStyleNames: ['Contents Active'],
/** whether to synchronize other text attributes beyond just the contents */
synchronizeAllTextAttributes: false,
/** whether to show results after running */
showResult: true,
};
var doc = app.activeDocument;
// confirm the paragraph styles are valid
var paragraphStyles = [];
for (var i = 0, style; i < settings.targetStyleNames.length; i++) {
style = getThing(doc.allParagraphStyles, 'name', settings.targetStyleNames[i]);
if (!style)
return alert('Document does not have the "' + settings.targetStyleNames[i] + '" style.');
paragraphStyles.push(style);
}
var found = [];
// find all contents in the styles
for (var i = 0; i < paragraphStyles.length; i++)
found = found.concat(findText(doc, { appliedParagraphStyle: paragraphStyles[i] }));
if (0 === found.length)
return alert('No text found in styles [' + settings.targetStyleNames + '].');
var counter = 0;
// update any text that's been overridden from master page
for (var i = found.length - 1; i >= 0; i--) {
if (0 === found[i].parentTextFrames.length)
// ignore overset paragraph
continue;
if (!found[i].parentTextFrames[0].overriddenMasterPageItem)
// ignore text with no master page item
continue;
if (settings.synchronizeAllTextAttributes) {
// duplicate the text of the master item
var insertionPoint = found[i].parentStory.insertionPoints.item(found[i].insertionPoints[0].index);
found[i].contents = '';
found[i].parentTextFrames[0].overriddenMasterPageItem.texts[0].duplicate(LocationOptions.AT_END, insertionPoint)
}
else
// just set the contents
found[i].contents = found[i].parentTextFrames[0].overriddenMasterPageItem.contents;
counter++;
}
if (settings.showResult)
alert('Synchronized ' + counter + ' texts.');
};
app.doScript(main, ScriptLanguage.JAVASCRIPT, undefined, UndoModes.ENTIRE_SCRIPT, 'Update Overridden Texts');
/**
* Returns result of search in the supplied `findIn` object
* using its findText method.
*
* Example:
* var headingParas = findText(doc, { appliedParagraphStyle: headingStyle });
*
* @author m1b
* @version 2025-04-18
* @param {Document|Text} findIn - any object with a valid `findText` method.
* @param {Object} findWhat - an object containing findChangeTextOptions properties.
* @returns {Array<Text>}
*/
function findText(findIn, findWhat) {
if ('function' !== typeof findIn.findText)
throw new Error('findText: bad `where` supplied.');
// configure the find
app.findChangeTextOptions.properties = {
caseSensitive: false,
includeFootnotes: true,
includeHiddenLayers: false,
includeLockedLayersForFind: false,
includeLockedStoriesForFind: false,
includeMasterPages: true,
wholeWord: false,
};
// reset
app.findTextPreferences = NothingEnum.NOTHING;
// configure the find with settings
for (var key in findWhat) {
if (
findWhat.hasOwnProperty(key)
&& app.findTextPreferences.hasOwnProperty(key)
)
app.findTextPreferences[key] = findWhat[key];
}
// perform the find
return findIn.findText();
};
/**
* Returns a thing with matching property.
* If `key` is undefined, evaluate the object itself.
* @author m1b
* @version 2024-04-21
* @param {Array|Collection} things - the things to look through.
* @param {String} [key] - the property name (default: undefined).
* @param {*} value - the value to match.
* @returns {*?} - the thing, if found.
*/
function getThing(things, key, value) {
for (var i = 0, obj; i < things.length; i++)
if ((undefined == key ? things[i] : things[i][key]) == value)
return things[i];
};
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