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InDesign Book Creation Crashing During PDF Export—Incorrect Page Range in Book Panel

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
August 18, 2024
7 replies
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Hello InDesign gurus: Urgent help needed with Indesign book creation.
I imported a file into the book (INDB) panel. The file has 9 pages (with 4 section starts within the file) but the book panel says the page range is 1-2. Attached is a screen shot of the Book Pane showing page range and another of the actual page range. How can this be fixed?

More distressing and possibly related to the above: InDesign also crashes every time I make a test PDF from that file from the book panel.
The 26 other files that make up this book all show the correct page range, are fine when exporting to PDF from book panel is individual PDFs and also as compiled PDF. But the problem file is crucial to the functionality of the complete book - it contains the table of contents, among other things.
My troubleshooting steps so far:

checked all links (there are hundreds) - they work properly
cleared cache & preferences, then restarted InDesign
checked fonts - no problem here
saved the problem file as idml, then restarted from that

The deadline is imminent, so any advice would be hugely appreciated!

Performance

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Correct answer Angela PS Chan

I did check the hyperlinks and bookmarks panel on my end--all seemed fine there. My PDF included both bookmarks and hyperlinks.

Dave, I cannot thank you enough for all the advice and testing via screen-share - your expertise & patience are hugely appreciated.

As you recommended, I rebuilt the TOC within the TOC panes (for everyone following this thread, this doc is a legacy from over a decade ago and the TOC/links was manually done). I've now successfully made the complete, compiled PDF from the book pane where the links work. Yay!!!

The process was not quite as smooth as hoped, as new crashes occured during the re-build.

The problem seems to be due to the name of a paragraph style being ported into the TOC Styles pane. I tested this by replacing the problem style with one that definitely worked (TOC updated properly), then renaming that style to something more appropriately descriptive (TOC crashed when updating). No other parameters were changed. Do you have any insights about this?

Dave Creamer of IDEAS

Community Expert

Update on book crashing...

Angela sent me the book files, fonts, and graphics to test.

I replaced a few fonts since I'm on Windows and she is on Mac--just Times and Helvetica.

Some of those fonts were in graphics, so I edited them in the appropriate program.

I noticed the TOC was generated with hyperlinks and bookmarks, not with the actual TOC settings.

I then generated a PDF without issue.

We connected via Zoom and we tried it on her computer.

Crash!

After a number of tests/experiments, we were able to generate a PDF with just bookmarks in the PDF, but no hyperlinks on the TOC pages. (I suggested the online PDF only needed bookmarks anyway and showed her how to have the bookmark panel open automatically in Acrobat.)

However, nothing stopped the crashing when using hyperlinks.

I suggested she rebuild the TOC with a TOC style as it would only take an hour or so.

We will report back when we get the results.

Her Mac system is an older i5 processor with 24 GB RAM and 185 GB free space.

My Windows system is i9 processor with 96 GB RAM and 1.25 TB free on system/app M.2 drive.

However, I would think her system could handle the load.

David Creamer: Community Expert (ACI and ACE 1995-2023)

Abhishek Rao

Community Manager

Hello @Angela PS Chan,

I want to take a moment to sincerely appreciate the efforts Dave has put into helping you— your support are truly commendable.

We’ll be eagerly awaiting further updates from Dave as he continues to assist you with this. Your patience and cooperation mean a lot to us, and we’re here to ensure you receive the best possible support.

Thanks again for your trust in our community. We’re committed to assist you.

Thank you,
Abhishek Rao

Dave Creamer of IDEAS

Community Expert

As @leo.r mentioned, section markers do not show up in the book BY DEFAULT. Just the first page number and the last. For example, if you change the last section to alpha, your book will show 1-B. If you want the secton markers to show up, turn the setting below on; keep in mind that they section marker will show up on the page too.

If you run into a problem creating a PDF again, use the "binary" method--output half the book at a time (e.g., 1-50 and 51-100). Assuming only one half will fail, output half of the problem section at a time (e.g., 1-15 and 26-50). Continue until you narrow down the page(s) causing the problem.

When you mention that the front chapter has lots of "links"--are you referring to graphics, hyperlinks, or cross references?

David Creamer: Community Expert (ACI and ACE 1995-2023)

leo.r

Community Expert

As @leo.r mentioned, section markers do not show up in the book BY DEFAULT. Just the first page number and the last. If you want the secton markers to show up, turn the setting below on; keep in mind that they section marker will show up on the page too.

By @Dave Creamer of IDEAS

Does it affect the way page numbers show up in the book panel on your side? I have all the settings in your screenshot checked, but the book panel doesn't display any section prefixes or markers:

Dave Creamer of IDEAS

Community Expert

Make sure you update the book numbering after making changes.

I added a couple of prefixes and turned on the setting.

Before:

After:

David Creamer: Community Expert (ACI and ACE 1995-2023)

leo.r

Community Expert

InDesign also crashes every time I make a test PDF from that file from the book panel.

By @Angela PS Chan

Just to clarify: did you try to export that file to PDF from the file itself (not from the book panel)? Does it crash as well in this case?

leo.r

Community Expert

...ok you've just answered this while I was posting this question.

A

Angela PS ChanAuthor

Inspiring

I'm deconstructing the problem by deleting all the content from the problem pages and then adding each section back in sequentially, and making a test PDF in the book pane with each addition. So far, the PDFs have been successful, so I hope to isolate the problem bit in this manner - ie when it crashes again.

leo.r

Community Expert

I imported a file into the book (INDB) panel. The file has 9 pages (with 4 section starts within the file) but the book panel says the page range is 1-2. Attached is a screen shot of the Book Pane showing page range and another of the actual page range. How can this be fixed?

By @Angela PS Chan

As far as I understand, the page range in the book panel is actually correct:

The number of the first page is 1, and the last one is 2. The book panel doesn't include section prefixes*:

*EDIT: The panel actually WILL show section prefixes after Updating Numbering, as explained by @Dave Creamer of IDEAS below.

James Gifford—NitroPress

Legend

I didn't look closely at the screen snips. I don't really know how Books translate internal numbering but I think you're right in that the '1-2' is not an issue here.

I wonder if the two recto pages in a row are. I'd add a blank page after what appears to be the cover, and use sections to re/set the page numbering. (A and B, and then 1, 2, 3 etc. or some such.)

leo.r

Community Expert

Yes, here's another example:

I think ideally it would be nice if the book panel also displayed the number of pages ~~and listed the complete page numbers as seen in the Pages panel~~.

EDIT: The panel actually WILL show section prefixes after Updating Numbering, as explained by @Dave Creamer of IDEAS below.

James Gifford—NitroPress

Legend

Uh, wow. You've already tried most of the recommended fixes, with IDML being kind of the big gun in this respect. I can't imagine what's so corrupt in this file that it crashes even after all this cleanup.

I'd reconstruct the file from scratch, copying the content using the most minimal methods (paste without formatting, etc.) And if there is ANY placed or inserted element of any kind (graphic, mostly) I'd put it under a microscope, even open and resave with (for example) Photoshop.

kglad

Community Expert

in the future, to find the best place to post your message, use the list here, https://community.adobe.com/

p.s. i don't think the adobe website, and forums in particular, are easy to navigate, so don't spend a lot of time searching that forum list. do your best and we'll move the post (like this one has already been moved) if it helps you get responses.