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Participant
April 5, 2023
Question

Key command for non-breaking spaces

  • April 5, 2023
  • 4 replies
  • 6820 views

I use the key commands for non-breaking spaces (option+command-x) and non-breaking hyphens (option+command-) all the time. Those will work one minute, but randomly stop working. As of late, the non-breaking hyphen works consistantly, but the non-breaking space command doesn't work at all. Please help solve this!

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4 replies

Barb Binder
Community Expert
Community Expert
April 27, 2023

Hi @Sulaco:

 

Thank you for coming back to answer the questions. I'm on a Mac, but I've never had an issue with the shortcut not working and it works just fine in placeholder text – I just tried it. I think this needs to be reported on the uservoice page—one of you can report it, come back and add the link to the report here and the other one can vote for it. 

https://indesign.uservoice.com/

 

~Barb

~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
Sulaco
Inspiring
April 27, 2023

Thanks for replying @Barb Binder 

Intersting! Wonder if its related to Windows... I can't login to Uservoice with my Adobe ID anymore, suppose I need to register a new user, quite annoying. I will do some further testing and try and get around to posting about this over there. But I feel like it's a bit like shouting into a black void... usually just means that I am wasing my time and nothing ever happens...

@Wynn292677130srr  Doesn't seem like we are suffering from the same problem. Hope you can resolve your problem, but I suppose the Menu command always worked for you, right?

Inspiring
April 27, 2023

Hi, @Wynn292677130srr are you using the default keyboard Shortcuts Set or do you have any specific keyboard set?
If your using a different keyboard set then make a copy and select a different keyboard set.
Sometimes this happened to me.

 

Sulaco
Inspiring
April 26, 2023

I can't get the non-breaking spaces to work any more either. It's been like this for at least a year. It used to work fine, now it just refuses to play ball at all. Suspecting something is wrong with how InDesign prioritises the text flow rule set.

 

Resetting the preferences will not fix this. Have the problems on several machines, including at work.

Barb Binder
Community Expert
Community Expert
April 26, 2023

Hi @Sulaco:

 

We need additional information to help.

  1. Operating system?
  2. Version of InDesign?
  3. Does the menu command work (Type > Insert White Space > Non-breaking space) but the keyboard command does not?
  4. Is the expected shortcut listed next to the menu command?
  5. Are you working with Hidden Characters visible?

 

~Barb

~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
Participant
April 26, 2023

Hi! Thank you for following up with a response.

1. Currently on Ventura 13.3.1, but its been happening since before getting Ventura.

2. InDesign v18, but also been happening for a few previous versions as well.

3. The menu command does work, even when the key command does not.

4. I was attempting to use the key command listed next to the menu command (because I love that they are listed so I can learn them, because I hate using the menus).

5. I haven't paid attention to if I've had Hidden Characters visible or not since I toggle back and forth while working between showing hidden characters and hiding them. 

 

One thing I learned from a co-worker, she had a different key command that quit working, or would open something else up instead of do what the key command in InDesign was supposed to do. She found that if she holds the function (fn) key along with the shortcut listed next to the menu command, it will work. I have been doing that with the shortcut I use for non-breaking spaces, and it works. Its not ideal, but it keeps me from having to go to the menu. So, now I hold fn-cmd-opt + x to get the non-breaking space.


Just realized the comment from Barb wasn't for me. Hopefully my comment of adding the function key to the key command will help @Sulaco .

 

All the best!

Steve Werner
Community Expert
Community Expert
April 6, 2023

What I would try to do is restore your InDesign preferences and caches. Here's a link which explains how:

 

https://www.rockymountaintraining.com/adobe-indesign-rebuilding-preferences-cache/