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Participating Frequently
July 28, 2020
Question

List of words and frequency in a document

  • July 28, 2020
  • 1 reply
  • 955 views

I know I am crazy, but I need to create an index for a 550 page fairly technical document. Is there a way to generate a list of words in the document and how often they are used? 

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1 reply

Jongware
Community Expert
Community Expert
July 28, 2020

Absolutely -- it needs a script but nothing extraordinary.

 

What is in your opinion a "word"? A deliberate tricky question! Capitalization, hyphens, apostrophs, punctuation etc. all count.

 

What are you planning to do with the word frequencies? I bet "the" comes first, then "is" and "a".

Vendolis
Participant
December 9, 2020

I also would be super interested in this. It gives a good overview of the importance of words in a text. esp. in translating manuals, being aware of often used words can help with finding a good translation for them before actually starting the translation process.

Are there scripting guides for InDesign to help with writing such a tool? You make it sound that it should not be a big task.