Keyboard Shortcut assign missing

Report · Oct 25, 2023

I have been using Books in InDesign for years. Not necessarily for actual books but as a way of organising and outputting multiple files that can be kept in sections or catagories.

I have always been able to assign a keyboard shortcut to the Export function in the active books menu (see image below). Recently this shortcut ability has been removed from the menu for a reason I fail to understand.

Does anyone know why, or how to get around this?

Report · Oct 25, 2023

Can you tell us which version of InDesign still features this shortcut entry?

You could use the book export script from Peter Kahrel and add a keyboard shortcut to that script.
https://creativepro.com/files/kahrel/indesign/pdf_individuals.html

Report · Oct 25, 2023

To the best of my recall, I was aware of it not working from v18 onwards.

That script looks an interesting prospect, many thanks. I'll give it a try.

Edit: It seems perfect for actual books, but as some of the documents I work with are single pages, I need to be able to select multiple documents and produce a single PDF of them all regardless of how many pages they contain.

Back to square one I'm afraid.

Report · Oct 25, 2023

I still have a 17.x version on my system which doesn’t have that entry in the shortcut list either.

Report · Oct 25, 2023

Hmmm. I know for certain that I was able to do it in the past. Even so, regardless of the version, I fail to see why it's not available to be bound to a keyboard shortcut. My only thought is that the menu changes depending on if files in the book are selected or left as to be sent as a whole. From Export Book to PDF... to Export Selected Documents to PDF...

Other applications can ben forced through macOS, but even that is not allowed by InDesign.

Report · Nov 07, 2023

The best thing you can do for now is write a feature request on the InDesign Uservoice Forum: https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601021-adobe-indesign-feature-requests
After that get as many people as possible to vote for it. The more votes the more likely it gets implemented.