Script for shorthand typing

[Guest]

Word has a shorthand tool for abbreviating commonly used words and phrases.

You can set it up so when you type, lets say, "AC",  Word will spell out "Air Conditioning".

Is there a script that can do the same thing? 

Thank you

[John Hawkinson]

There is not a built-in feature to do this, no.

I suppose it might be possible to shoehorn a script into doing this, but it would not be elegant or bulletproof.

It is difficult to have a script run every time you press a letter.

You could conceivably have a script that looks at the insertion point and the characters behind it, and performs a substitution. But the question would then be how do you trigger the script to run. You could bind a key to it, such that you typed "AC<F1>" [or whatever] to have it expand. You could try to hook it in to InDesign's idle loop, but that might slow and unreliable. I don't think you could rebind the space key to run such a script, but I suppose that might work.

I think, though. there is not a great way to do to this without built-in support from the application which does not exist.

[Guest]

That's really too bad. It's probably doable, what you're saying, but as you say it might be slow and unreliable.

What I might try then, is go to the inDesign preferences to customize the autocorrect function by adding words to "autocorrect".

The problem with this is in inDesign autocorrect will NOT work when working with "placed" word doc files, which are the majority of files I'm working with.

In other words if you place a word document and start typing in it the autocorrect doesn't function, even if it's enabled. I don't understand why that is.

So the work around I'm thinking of is using my script to not only place the word doc but ALSO copy it and create a new inDesign text frame and paste the

text into that.

If that is acheived the autocorrect should be enabled.

I don't know if that is possible, it's all hypothetical, but that's what I'm going to try.

[Colin Flashman · Accepted solution]

What I might try then, is go to the inDesign preferences to customize the autocorrect function by adding words to "autocorrect".

The problem with this is in inDesign autocorrect will NOT work when working with "placed" word doc files, which are the majority of files I'm working with.

In other words if you place a word document and start typing in it the autocorrect doesn't function, even if it's enabled. I don't understand why that is.

i've just tried to replicate this fault and can't get the same result. when i place word files into indesign, my autocorrect feature works AOK. HOWEVER, this has to do with the dictionary assigned to the text within the type once in indesign...  while in indesign if i highlight all the text I imported from word and go to the control bar and change the dictionary from "English UK" to "[No Language]", ONLY THEN does autocorrect not work.

when bringing in stories from word, highlight any of the type and see what dictionary is in use - is it English USA or English UK, or is it something with square brackets around it? if the answer is "it has square brackets around it" i'd say that is the issue.

i've written a post on my own blog which contains a script which will change all the dictionary assigned to any stories in an indesign file. go to:

http://colecandoo.wordpress.com/2011/05/01/check-and-re-check/

hope this helps

ps - never knew word had a shorthand feature... been fifteen years since I was using it all the time. i think the OP is on the right track with autocorrect, but try fixing the dictionaries and tell us what happens.

[Guest]

Hello cdflash

I'll definitely check that out, if it's a simple fix it could save alot of work...alot of scripting.

Thanks alot