How to append a text variable to the page numbers value?

Report · Apr 02, 2018

Greetings,

I have a book document with several articles (sections) that each start from page 1. So output of automatically generated table of content is like:

article #1 …………….1 to 25
article #2 …………….1 to 87

The reason for having each individual article star at page 1 is the articles are generated individually over the course of a year, and at the end of the year we want to bundle them together in a single PDF.

Normally, the simple way to create a distinction for each article is using section prefixes(e.g. a,b,c,d,…) so the table of content will look like:

article #1 …………….a1 to a25
article #2 …………….b1 to b87

However, we use a unique identifier (something like: 10.1000/123456) which is longer than the maximum number of characters allowed in section prefix (which is 8)

So ideally, my table of content should look like this:

article #1 …………….10.1000/123456-1 to 10.1000/123456-25
article #2 …………….10.1000/123457-1 to 10.1000/123457-87

Now my question is, how to append a string to the page number, so it can be generated and displayed automatically along with the page number, in index, table of content and page numbers in footers?

Thanks for your help in advance,
Kasra

Footnote:
This is a more abstract/universal variation of a question I already asked on the forum, which is currently unanswered:(https://indesignsecrets.com/topic/having-dois-in-a-journal-index)

Report · Apr 04, 2018

Hi All,

I think I've found a not-so-elegant way to fix this:

First, I create unique section prefixes for each article. Like (§1§,§2§,...,§n§). Just making sure it's impossible for anybody to have that in their articles.

Then I generate index, select it and "find and replace" each section prefix with corresponding DOI:

§1§ Maps to DOI_String_1

§2§ Maps to DOI_String_2

............

§n§ Maps to DOI_String_n

And there you have it. No scripting required.

Please let me what you think.

Kind regards,

Kasra

Report · Apr 05, 2018

I think you can first thank Peter Kahrel about this “found” on IndesgnSecrets, then do it like this will trigger human errors! Don’t forget the TOC and the current page numbers!

A script “click” will always be a click! ...

Best,

Michel, from FRIdNGE