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casinclaire
casinclaire
Inspiring
June 21, 2020
Question

Issues with Polygon/Line tool in Adobe InDesign 2020

  • June 21, 2020
  • 2 replies
  • 744 views

I think my situation has manifested just since the latest update; if it was happening before, I didn't notice.  Just this week, I've needed to use both the line and polygon tools in InD, and instead of drawing to the size I drag the mouse, they pop in at the whole width/breadth of my document page. E.g., I just tried to draw a very small triangle, and when I released the mouse, the triangle completely filled my 8x8 page. I can't find a setting to manage this behavior (is it in preferences or what?). I hope there is one. In all the years I've used InD, I've never run into this. Maybe it's always been this way and maybe just luck I'm dealing with it now, but it is aggravating. Does anyone know how to fix this? Thanks in advance. 🙂

 

{Renamed by MOD}

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2 replies

L
Laubender
Community Expert
June 23, 2020

Hi casinclaire,

that would happen if you did an object style that would dictate the size and position of a graphic frame.

Plus, and that's important, that object style is made the default style. So look into your Object Styles panel and see if a custom object style is the default one. Properties Size and Position. Or if you changed the default object style for graphic frames with properties Size and Position.

 

This is a link to a document where I made an object style like that the default:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/59e4aiblhfut9sp/ObjectStyle-SizeAndPosition-DEFAULT-15.1.1.103.indd?dl=1

 

How is this document done? See below from my German InDesign.

A new default object style is defined in the Object Styles panel:

 

 

Size and Position restrict all new drawn items, graphic lines etc.pp. to the area of the margins.

 

 

This is no bug. It's a feature.

 

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

casinclaire
casinclaireAuthor
Inspiring
June 23, 2020

@Ashutosh and @Laubender,

 

Thanks for your replies:)  I have realized my problem and am embarrassed to admit it. I had no color applied to the stroke, so all I was seeing was the bounding box. Once I applied color to the stroke, I began to see the shapes I was expecting. I think I was expecting to see the actual shapes a la Illustrator (esp. with the polygon tool).

 

However, still am glad I got the info from you two that I did. Every once in a while I run into Object Style problems, and these links and tips will help me with that. Thanks again!

 

C.

Ashutosh_Mishra
Ashutosh_Mishra
Inspiring
June 23, 2020

Hi there,

 

Thanks for reaching out. Would you mind sharing version of the OS & InDesign? Does it happen with a specific document or all?
You may try resetting the preferences of InDesign and see if it helps. Please follow the instructions on this help article and let us know how it goes.

**Please note that resetting preferences will remove all the custom settings and InDesign will launch with default settings. You can also take a backup of the folders in case you want to. Location is mentioned in the article.

 

I'd also request updating InDesign to the latest version for better performance and stability. Hope it helps.

 

Regards,

Ashutosh

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