Is it possible to convert index numbers in InDesign to a form other than numbers?

[Farid Ely]

Hello Adobe community,
I have an urgent question and I couldn't find an answer elsewhere.
The question is about the index in AndDesign, and exactly when it is included in the epub version.
Can we convert the numbers that appear in front of the topics to another form, and at the same time keep the links working?
My friend, whose book I am working on, insists on this point a lot, and I have never read anything about this topic.
Thanks in advance for reading and for the help.

[Eric Dumas]

Hi,

Can you share a screenshot of what you have at the moment?

I am not sure what you mean by the 'number in front of the topic'

An Index is a list of words you chose to include in an Alphabetical catalogue, InDesign will search these words and add to the list (index) the page number where they appear. more here Create an index in InDesign (adobe.com)

In case the number you mention is a page number, maybe you meant a Table of Content (a list of headings catalogued using the formatting you apply to text in your book and listed to reflect the page number they are located). That can be adjusted in the Style settings of the TOC. In the screenshot below, the page number is after the entry.

[Farid Ely]

Thank you very much, and sorry for not explaining what I meant well enough. Now this is what I'm talking about and it's shown in the picture.
Can we replace those numbers with something that performs the same role?

[Farid Ely]

Thank you very much, and sorry for not explaining what I meant well enough. Now this is what I'm talking about and it's shown in the picture.
Can we replace those numbers with something that performs the same role?

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

What do you have in mind that would "perform the same role" but not be page numbers?

[Peter Kahrel]

Jump to an instance. In reflowable Epubs page numbers are useless. 

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

The entire line should be a link in an EPUB; for that result, just define the TOC without page numbers.

However, that skips over the notion that in-page TOCs are fairly useless in ebooks anyway, since the dynamic TOC is readily available throughout the book and can be defined to more depth as well.

[Peter Kahrel]

> The entire line should be a link in an EPUB

No, just the page number. You could have more than one page reference for a topic. His sample doesn't show that, but it's still possible.

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

It wasn't clear if this is an index or a TOC, but on looking closer, I guess the multiple page numbers mean 'index.'

I'm back to my original question... other than random glyphs, what would you substitute for numbers to retain the same function? It's like saying "I want a hyperlink here, but without a link."

[Farid Ely]

Thank you very much for your interest, and thank you for this large amount of information that came in the dialogue.
It's really about index. The issue is that my friend did not like the appearance of the numbers since they do not lead to a specific page that has the same number (as we know, epub, by its nature, does not work with page numbering), so we wondered if there was a way to replace the numbers without the links losing their function after exporting.
The solution provided by Mr. Peter Karhel was effective, direct and immediate, so thank you all..
My respect..

[Farid Ely]

Sorry, I meant by the respected professor “Peter Kahrel”.
I made a mistake in writing..
Thank you and my deep respect..

[Peter Kahrel · Accepted solution]

In the GREP tab of the Find/Change window,

Find what: [\s,]\s\K\d+

Change to: <Your replacement string>

Click somewhere in the index, and select Story from the Search dropdown. 

[Farid Ely]

Thank you very much, Professor Peter Kahrel. The problem was solved as you please, dear sir.
I was afraid that the links would not maintain their work within the index if we did this, but the replacement was completed successfully and the links after exporting to epub all work efficiently.
I convey to you greetings from my friend.
Thank you very much !

[Nedlaw]

Hi! This is great -- with a small however that shows I am missing something.

Summary of problem: The eventual EPUB does not appear to link from the Index to the instance, and I'm not sure how to figure this out/debug. I am aware that EPUB is a set of zipped HTML docs.

Details:

1. I created an InDesign book with two documents; call them targets.indd and index.indd.
2. In targets.indd, there are three pages, each containing a single item; this, that, and the other thing.
3. I created a normal index, which showed the three items and their respective page numbers.
4. I tested this by creating a PDF, and the ID links from the index to the target were in place and worked.
5. I ran the GREP, and replaced each of the page numbers with the word "Go."
6. I tested this revision by creating a PDF, and the ID links from the index to each target still worked (this is great!).
7. I created an EPUB version of the doc. This is where I began to have trouble. In ID, Window | Interactive | EPUB interactivity preview showed the target pages and the index page. While the EPUB previewer gave me a finger "pointer," clicking the word Go in the index did not take me to the target.
8. I opened the EPUB in Calibre (not an Adobe product; I know). In Calibre, clicking the word Go took me to the target -- so as far as the HTML was concerned, this arrangement works.
9. I opened the EPUB in Kindle Previewer 3.78 (just downloaded today; not an Adobe product, I know). The Kindle Previewer displayed the three target pages and the Index, but clicking Go in the index did not take me to the targets. There was no reaction to the click.

So in both the Adobe EPUB previewer and in the Kindle EPUB previewer, the index links did not work. But in both PDF and in Calibre, they did.

I am puzzled why the links appear to work sometimes but not others. I am sure this is because I am missing something that I otherwise should know. The GREP works just fine... except I don't end up with an index usable in EPUB. Any advice?

Thanks as always to the community.

-j

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

See my reply to your other post.

I believe indexes are too fragile to correct with GREP or even direct editing; a close look at the IDML code might show why, but I suspect it's breaking some critical sequence in the link code.