How can one index objects with titles?

[Jason Burnett]

I have a lot of images that represent handwritten recipes. Each recipe (photo) has a title to it. I would like to be able to create a master index of these titles for the end of the book. I'd also like to create small table of content pages for the beginning of each section. 

How do I add a Title to my images (just the data, not text and not a caption) that can be collected and the page number associated with the Object be returned? Do I need a script for this?

I'm quickly approaching 250+ pages and manually indexing all of these recipes seems like too much work, especially when reorganizing pages. Surely, someone has done something like this before and has a suggestion of the easiest way to manage this automatically.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

What do you mean by "just the data, not text and not a caption"?

I think the easiest way would be to group a TextFrame with the photo and put any info you want there - with some dedicated Char / Para Style. 

If you split sections to separate INDD files - you should be able to do index per file and then complete index for the Book. 

Or it could always be scripted. 

[Jason Burnett]

@Robert at ID-Tasker  Thanks again for your help.. I figured I would apply different styles for each section then run a new TOC for each section. I have already created the Parent Page items for all 9 sections (both header and content pages) and have a special style for the Section Title text allowimg me to easily do the TOC for the sections (in the front of the book).
I make a text frame that won't print, but contains the title of the recipes, if I go to create a new TOC for the section title page (which includes only the recipes in that section), it updates my book TOC. Are you only allowed to create one  TOC per document? I would like a  TOC for each section as well as a TOC for the book (listing sections) then have all of that compiled into a Index at the back of the book.

Do I have to divide my file into separate sections to handle the TOC for each section? But then, how do I combine the sections into one final document for the master TOC/Index. 

I tried doing Recipe 1 (style for section 1 TOC) and Recipe 2 (style for section 2 TOC) but that didn't work. Perhaps there is another way? And wIth the TOC, do I  have to manually generate this each time there's an update? Or does it automatically track new entries for me? 

Also, do you know where to get the scripting reference for InDesign? I keep looking for it but can't find it. I'm pretty good with JS, but need the documentation for the specifcl model used by InDesign. I figure I could pretty easily write a script to gather the information I need and generate the TOCs per section like I want. 

Thanks again for your help. I really appreciate it.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

https://www.indesignjs.de/extendscriptAPI/indesign-latest/#about.html

It would be REALLY much easier if you split your current document into smaller chunks - chapters / sections - and then combine them using Book feature. 

This way - you'll have exactly the same structure - with just different content. 

Index won't update itself - but if you are good with JS - you can easily script it - your script would need to either open the book and then go through collection of Documents - or just process Documents from the specified folder - and update TextFrames with Index.

That way - InDesign will do the heavy lifting for you.

[Peter Spier]

Not sure what @Jason Burnett has in mind to include in the "index" at the end, but from the original post it sounds like maybe just the recipe titles, rather than, say, entries for each ingredient so you could find lots of different recipes using kale or tomatoes.

A complex index like that will require a LOT of manual work to list whatever you want to include as real text on the pages, but if it's just titles, then as @Lukas Engqvist pointed out its really just one more TOC.

[Jason Burnett]

@Robert at ID-Tasker  I followed your advice and created the following structure as a Book:

There are basically 3 parts to the book. The FrontMatter, the MainContent, and the BackMatter.

The MainContent is divided into 10 Sections with single word titles of food groups (i.e. Breads, Meats, etc)

I created the following documents:

00 FrontMatter

01  Appetizers

;;;

10 Cookies

11 BackMatter

I added all 12 documents to the Book.

Each of the MainContent sections (01-10)  has a similar format. I created a header spread and a content spread. (See images)  The header spread contains an empty text frame (for the section TOC) and the content pages are blank with page numbers and some graphic headers/footers.. 

Section Header Parent Spreads

Sample Section Header Parent Spread-Contains a formatted (unlocked) text box to hold the TOC

Section Content Parent Spreads

Section Content Parents - With page numbers--all layers locked.

Section Spreads

Section Spreads. The Header Spread comes first, then I import the images into the Content Spreads adding Static Captions for each using the Recipe Title paragraph style.

This allows me to then go to the header page and insert a TOC. I set the title of the TOC to the name of the section and the paragraph style to Section Title and tell it to find the Recipe Titles for content. 

After doing this for all content sections, I return the 00 FrontMatter file and generate a Table of Contents for the Book indexing the Section Titles (created by the TOC entries for each section).

Then in the 11 BackMatter document, I create another TOC that indexes the Recipe Titles and alphabetizes them for the entire book. I'll label it Recipe Index.

I was hoping to create an Alphabetic Index instead of a TOC at the end of the book. So, I'll manually Add the letters into the TOC to make it look like an index. 

Does this seem like a reasonable plan? I'm about halfway through importing the recipes from Version 1. So if there are any other suggestions, let me know. Thanks for the Book suggestion. Hope this all makes sense. 

@Peter Spier @Lukas Engqvist @Robert at ID-Tasker @James Gifford—NitroPress  Thanks for the great help and information.

[Lukas Engqvist]

Seems lika a plan. If problems turn up we'll be here to try figure it out, but seems solid.

If you are using a book you just need to remember to "include book documents" in the TOC dialog box. 

[Jason Burnett]

So after learning so much from this thread about TOC, I decided that I wanted to create a master set of styles that worked in every document. I created the styles in advanced and literally every single object had an object styles and paragraph style if necessary. I even created TOC styles for each Chapter and different Styles for the Recipe Index and the front TOC.

Then I rebuilt the entire document, all 10 chapters to be identically configured. I put meta data in ALL of the images (cutlines for photos and recipe titles for recipes). So I could live caption them. Everything worked great.

However,now when I try to create the alphabetized TOC entry (Recipe Index) at the back of the book, it refuses to alphabetize and all of the entries come out in completely random order. I can't find any logic behind it. I get all the entries, just not alphabetically. 

Any Ideas?

When I copy and paste the content into a text editor, rather than the standard \r\n endofline characters, they have CTRLF added. Any ideas why this would be?

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

As mentioned earlier - you should create INDEX at the end - not TOC.

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

TOCs, indexes and cross references are three completely separate features that work in quite different ways.

Only Index automatically sorts alphabetically as an integral function. TOC alpha sorting is more complicated and less reliable. For one thing, it's by TOC style/level, which can get complicated (==confused).

To be complete, cross-references are a very flexible system but much more complex and without the automatic sorting and organizing features of the other two. It's common, for example, to build very complex TOCs using CR, but it takes a lot of work.

I have to admit I am puzzled at your continuing problems, as simply making a TOC of chapter headings is... all but trivial. Even if you choose to alpha them. Are you actually using the "Table of Contents" feature, and not Index?

[Peter Spier]

As mentioned earlier - you should create INDEX at the end - not TOC.

By @Robert at ID-Tasker

I would disagree. In this case all he seems to be looking for is a master list of the recipe names, not locations for a lot of key words.

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

I dunno; it's his call. But a page-order TOC at one end and an alphabetical list at the other is good; while it would have strange formatting for an index, that might do the second job better.

[Peter Spier]

I'd liken this to an "index of advertisers" I used to do for an antique dealers directory where we listed the sponsorsd who bought display ads in the booklet.

I grouped non-printing tags with the name of the advertiser pre-fixed with a code number that sorted them into categories, and generated a TOC, then used a series of Find/Change queries (thanks to @Peter Kahrel ) to combine multiple listings for folks with two or more ads and to remove the sort numbers.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

But a list - without reference points - is rather pointless? 

[Peter Spier]

To alphabetize your TOC you should be able to use the SortParagraphs.jsx script you'll find in the sample scripts included with InDesign...

[Peter Spier]

You can have as many TOCs as you like. They must each be in their own text thread (not as part of other running text), though, and will not update automatically

[Peter Spier]

And if you don't want those text frames to print, you should still be able to use the content for TOC and indexing.

[Lukas Engqvist]

Sounds like you are wanting to do a table of contents. If the titles are written with a unique Paragraph Style that is quite easily done, and can be sorted alphabetically if you prefer. A Table of Contets (TOC) is also linked as bookmarks that you can use in InDesign or in the PDF or EPUB you would export. (InDesign can have several TOCs). But as @Robert at ID-Tasker says the first part is to isolate the text into a separate (and unique) Paragraph Style

There should be plenty tutorials online on the process. The documentation is here https://helpx.adobe.com/indesign/using/creating-table-contents.html

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

I assume the images are anchored to something... they should be, in general practice, and must be, for EPUB export. I'd create a descriptive page title for each, probably with a break to new page included, and anchor the recipe image to each. Then TOC the titles.