Table of content for placed .indd files

[mschefers]

Hello,

i have to set up a TOC for a PDF document containing roughly about 120 spreads. There is a cover, an editorial and 4-6 text pages. And up to 56 double-sided product sheets (each for a car model) which i generated via data merge. These product sheets contain the car name formatted with "Car name" paragraph style and i place them (they are 56 separate .indd files) in the brochure document.

Is there a way i can generate a TOC automatically and this includes all of the car names, even if the "car name" paragraph style (and the car name text field itself) are located in the sub-file? Do i have to copy the content of each product sheet into the brochure doc to have the TOC being generated? Or how would you approch this?

Thanks a lot!

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Script would do the trick 😉 what platform - PC or Mac? 

[mschefers]

Working on a PC.

[Daniel301670784msf]

Will you help me create a script taht can do this?

I have multiple books (.indb) that need the same section. But each book has a unique sidebar. In order to have repeated content alongside unique content I made a Parent version of the .indd file that is placed onto Children .indd files. The Child versions appear in each differnt book. 

Everything was looking to work as intended until I went to build the TOCs. Because my paragraph styles are on the Parent page, the TOC results are balnk. 

Thank you in advance.

[Daniel301670784msf]

So I went away from this idea and used a script to tun on/off layers. The TOC works perfectly now. Thank you anyhow. Cheers.

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS]

If you placed the PDFs via Data Merge, why not add the car name as part of the csv file? The name can be placed in a non-printing text frame for the TOC to pick up.

Another possible option is to use a metadata caption that will fill in automatically when the image (PDF) is placed.

[mschefers]

Hey, thank you.

My data merge output have been 56 .indd files, each for another car and including that name, coming from the csv (or txt in my case).

I another document i placed these .indd files. That is the document i am working in and where i need the TOC to be generated.

Maybe i misuntersand some things in the workflow. Ill attach some Screens: an overwiew, an example of one of the placed files and the TOC, which is at the moment made manually and ignoring all the product pages, except for the example ARI 345 Food Truck.

[Dave Creamer of IDEAS · Accepted solution]

You would need to add the car info into a text frame on each page. Based on my understanding of your workflow, @brian_p_dts suggestion would be your best option.

[brian_p_dts · Accepted solution]

Why are you  placing the merged documents. You can generate a TOC of an entire Book if you just add all the files to a Book file. 

https://helpx.adobe.com/indesign/using/creating-table-contents.html