Is there a way to have continuous footnotes on a 250 page report without linking pages.

[jennyo89533863]

Can you tell me if there is a way to continuously have numbered footnotes without linking pages. I have several chapters in a 250 page report. The report has 50 or more footnotes and requires to be numbered

consecutively.

[Randy Hagan]

How is your report prepared? Is it a single document that makes up your full report? Or is it multiple InDesign documents that you compile into your final report?

[jennyo89533863]

Or is there anyway to manually change the footnote # to make the footnotes consecutive?

[jennyo89533863]

The files is designed in spreads.

[jennyo89533863]

And a single document, designed in spreads.

[Eugene Tyson]

In your Type>Footnote Options

Try changing the settings

[Peter Kahrel · Accepted solution]

You can't. The only way to have footnote numbers numbered consecutively across stories is by threading them. InDesign's footnote start number can be set at the document level only. One of the shortcomings of ID's footnotes.

[jennyo89533863]

Even if I start new section throughout the document, the footnotes will not allow to start at another number??????

This is a common problem. So what is my solution, physically add footnotes, that are really not footnotes?

Thanks.

[Peter Kahrel]

Correct. You can have footnotes restart numbering at every section (or page, or spread), but the start number can be set only once. So if you set the start number to 12, and restart numbering every section, then every section starts numbering at 12.

Join the crowd clamouring for footnote improvements at https://indesign.uservoice.com!

[Eugene Tyson]

Thanks for clearing that up, Peter.

[jennyo89533863]

Thanks Peter... kind of ridiculous!!! I will join the crowd. Cheers and enjoy your day!

[FRIdNGE]

It's not because you use unthreaded stories that you can't play with a relevant footnote numbering!

You could skirt it using another kind of numbering played by Script!

(^/)  The Jedi

[jennyo89533863]

Not sure what you are pertaining to ? You could skirt it using another kind of numbering played by Script! How do I do that? as of now I am placing the foot notes manual... which will not be interactive, which will be a problem.

[FRIdNGE]

Numbering Footnotes is a mind view that hasn't necessarily something to see with the way InDesign numerotates basically footnotes!

Like in this video where footnotes are restarted after a para with a specific para style!  😉

https://youtu.be/2AzF_iE9trs

(^/)

[Randy Hagan]

Closer to the mark is that you need the text to be read by InDesign as one text thread. There are lots of instances where this may not be the best idea, but in this instance it's vital.

It can all be one InDesign document, but when you place the Chapter 1 word processing file, then the Chapter 2 file after it, etc., InDesign reads those as separate articles inside the single document. So you get footnote numbering for Article/Chapter 1, then again for Article/Chapter 2, etc. with its own discrete markers and numbering.

You fix that by making Chapter 2 an extension of Article/Chapter 1's text thread. not a separate, discrete article after it.

Try this:

• If Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 are separate placed text threads, click anywhere into Chapter 2 with your Type tool. Then choose the Edit>Select All menu command to highlight everything in that text thread and then Edit>Copy to place all the text and formatting for Chapter 2 into the clipboard.
• Now navigate to the end of Chapter 1 and get your Arrow/Selection tool. You're only doing this because you want to confirm you're at the absolute end of the Article/Chapter 1 text thread. Click on the last text frame for Chapter 1 and make sure it has a blank exit point like the example circled below. If it doesn't, extend the bottom of the text frame until you see a blank exit point.
• 

   Now get your Text tool again. Click after the last character/punctuation point of Article/Chapter 1 and hit the Enter/Return key to skip down one line. Then Select the Edit>Paste menu command to place a copy of all the text and formatting for Article/Chapter 2 at the end of the threaded text of Article/Chapter 1 and create an extension of the first text thread.

• Go back to your original Article/Chapter 2 with your Text tool and click anywhere in that discrete text thread. Use the Edit>Select All menu command to highlight all the text and formatting for that discrete text thread, then Edit>Clear to delete it all.
• Note: This is why it's safer to copy the content to the clipboard rather than just cut it. If things go wrong, it's better to have two instances of all the formatted text for Article/Chapter 2 than mess up and not have one at all.
• Get your Arrow/Selection tool and click on the small + sign exit point for Article/Chapter 1. This will pick up all the following formatted text for Chapter 2 with what InDesign inelegantly calls its Place Gun, but now it's an extension of the text thread for Article/Chapter 1. as shown below:
• Navigate to the empty text frame where you started with the discrete Article/Chapter 2, and put your Place Gun cursor at the upper-left corner of the frame where it shows two little chain links with the cursor. Click the left mouse button to place all the formatted text for Chapter 2 right where it was before, but now as an extension of the first text thread. So now it's still Chapter 2, but InDesign recognizes it as an extension of Article 1.
• Lather/Rinse/Repeat until all the separate, discrete articles in your InDesign document become one single article/text thread.

This is how you get your sequential footnotes. If Chapter 1 has, say, 20 footnotes and Chapter 2 has 15; making them one single text thread will number your footnotes from 1-35.

Hope this helps,

Randy

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

Wouldn't making each chapter an INDD file and combining them in a book allow consecutive numbering? (Trying to remember if I've ever used book + running numbered footnotes.)

[FRIdNGE]

You will need a script here too!

(^/)

[Peter Kahrel]

> Wouldn't making each chapter an INDD file and combining them in a book allow consecutive numbering?

Yes, that's the best approach. You can set the start number in each document. You could do that with a simple script, too, as Michel suggests. But a script is not necessary.

[jennyo89533863]

This sounds like a lot of extra steps. So what your saying is each chapter should be in another design file? and combined??? getting confused

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

It's a design judgment call whether to maintain chapters as stories in one INDD file or make them separate file and combine/manage them in a Book. It doesn't sound as if it gets around the basic problem (auto-numbering across the chapter files), so it may not be worth your trouble. (This is anomalous, as the whole point of a Book is that it does generate consistent page and other numbering for TOCs and the like.)

[jennyo89533863]

Thanks. This is a government report. It just seems to me that calls for room for error...It would just be ideal if footnotes could be a little more versatile. I will add them in manually. Just another indesign glitch!!!!

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

I can't think of a reason that making the report all one text flow would be a problem, as long as your chapter heads are defined to start on a new page, etc. That would let you use auto-numbering for everything.

I've never found it very useful to maintain more than one story in an ID project. Maybe I'm weird. 🙂

[jennyo89533863]

It is when there are numerous charts and graphics and photos throughout each chapter.

[Randy Hagan]

That's the advantage of the workflow I offered above.

Since you're rethreading your additional text through the exact frames that were used before to hold your additional, discrete article, your updated layout will quickly match your previous one. Nothing's perfect, and it's worth it to proof all your pages to make sure you don't get any bad type breaks between the text frames, but it's very quick and efficient.

It took me about an hour to type out the process above. But after you do it a couple of times, I'd be surprised if it took you 5 minutes a shot to copy/remove a discrete article from your document and addit to the end of a previous one to extend your primary text thread.

This is a common issue, and a common fix, for translating print documentation into reflowable epubs. So you might want to keep this in your bag of tricks to serve many tasks.

Hope this helps,

Randy

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

If objects are anchored to the relevant text, it should not matter whether it's one story or ten. But if each story is a collection of loose pieces... yeah, I don't see any easy solution. Set the numbering manually for each story and you should get to a point where it doesn't need further adjustment.