Issues with DropCap Tracking

[gethmed]

Hi, I've been working on this document for several months now with a dropcap character style nested into my main body paragraph style.

Things have been fine till recently as I finalise it for export. Perhaps an adjustment I made in some other global settings have affected the spacing for certain paragraphs.
I've included multiple screenshots in the attached doc. Would appreciate any advise to resolve the overlapping / clashing text!

[Robert Tkaczyk]

Would be much more convenient if you can attach those screenshots directly. 

[gethmed]

Drop Cap Character Style (Tracking: 170)

Results: Tracking of 170 based on the Character Style is applied in most paragraphs.

              

Tracking of 170 is not taking effect in a few paragraphs, as shown below. Body text collides with nested Dropcap:

      

Here are the Paragraph Style settings for the Body text:

[Willi Adelberger]

Do all drop caps have a space followed?

What if you include a followed space into the drop cap settings? 2 lines, 2 characters?

What if you increase the tracking for the drop caps character style?

[gethmed]

Yes, most have a space following the dropcap.

However, those paragraphs where the dropcap collides with the body text don't seem to budge, whether a space is added or tracking is increased.

Adjusting the drop cap settings to 2 characters seems to solve it, the only exception being one or two paragraphs where the drop cap is the first alphabet of a word i.e. I would prefer that only the 1st character be a dropcap.

I suppose a quick solution would be to make the settings 2 lines 2 characters and manually create dropcap for the exceptional paragraphs? Any other suggestions?

[Robert Tkaczyk]

Can't you rewrite those "i.e."?

And instead of local override - apply new ParaStyle? 

[gethmed]

I'm still wondering why this didn't show up as an issue for months on this project till now.

Nevertheless Thank you, I'll do that for those exceptional paragraphs.

[gethmed]

The only odd thing now is that the spacing between the Dropcap and nested style is inconsistent.

Those which collided previously are now decently spaced (a small but acceptable space).
Those which were well spaced previously are now too widely spaced.

Decently spaced:

Too wide a space now for all other instances:

   

[Robert Tkaczyk]

How often are you doing Save As with a new name?

If not very often, then maybe your file got corrupted - so try IDMLing?

[gethmed]

I regularly save the file, but not as a new file with a new name.

How does saving as IDML help? I do not see a difference upon reopening the IDML file.

[Robert Tkaczyk]

It's very bad. 

Do Save As with a new name and you should see a big difference in the size of the file - plus, it should open and work faster. 

IDMLing is a housekeeping - removes all the previews stored in the INDD file and also removes the Undo history that accumulated over the time. 

It also gets rid of the gremlins that might be there. 

[gethmed]

That step has been taken.

The tracking space between dropcap and body text remains inconsistent and
unresolved.

Alternate advice, anyone?

Could it be my body text settings that have to be tweaked?