Participant

Answered

Trouble with "mystery" page breaks in InDesign

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
January 6, 2020
4 replies
6901 views

We're having some trouble with "mystery" line breaks in InDesign and I couldn't find a previous thread on this topic.

We're running InDesign on an iMac in case that matters.

We turned on hidden characters and there is no page break symbol where the breaks are occuring. The text just suddenly stops on one page and then starts again on the next page.

There are no page breaks in the Word doc we imported from.

Any suggestions? Thank you!!

Bug

Correct answer Randy Hagan

Generally when people have odd, unexplainable page breaks I refer them to two areas where they often find the root of their problem:

Text Wrap

and

Keep Options

If there are graphic elements at/near the spot where a funky page break occurs, I recommend opening the Text Wrap panel, then using the Selection/Black Arrow tool to select graphics and InDesign-created elements and frames in the area of the unexpected page break. Very often one of those elements/frames has an unexpected text wrap setting which is throwing the text flow off the existing page and onto the next one. Don't forget to check Master Page Items if you've placed them in your document. You can't select them without extra effort on the document pages, but when you go to the applicable master page(s) those offending elements can be detected.

If you find any elements with an unexpected text wrap, turn the text wrap off and see if the text flows as you expect it to.

For text-based funky breaks, they generally come from odd Keep Options set in the Paragraph Style options box. Get your Text tool and place your cursor into the block of text before the page break, then open the Paragraph Styles panel and see which style, if any, has been applied to the paragraph. Pay special attention to whether the style shows a plus (+) sign after the style in the panel, which will show custom formatting has been applied to the paragraph. Go to the flyaway menu — the spot where three horizontal lines are in the upper-right of the panel, and select the Style Options... menu command to open the Paragraph Style Options box. On the left side, select the Keep Options box in the menu. Make sure that the Keep check boxes are not selected, and that the Paragraph: options box is set to Start Anywhere. Now click in the first line on the following page and do the same thing. Any settings in the Keep Options section can cause unpredictable results.

I'd say in the vast majority of cases, unpredictable page breaks are due to one of these two factors — like 95%+ of the time. If these are not a factor, plese share some screen shots of where you're getting strange results and we'll do our best to help you.

Hope this helps,

Randy

Dave Creamer of IDEAS

Community Expert

As mentioned:

Paragraph keep options

Incorrect Start Paragraph settings.

Also check:

No Break setting applied incorrectly.

Excessive paragraph space above.

David Creamer: Community Expert (ACI and ACE 1995-2023)

PubCDAuthor

Participant

Thank you! I meant to reply and totally forgot. We tried all of the above, no luck, but then reflowed the text to start from scratch and... it was fine. So, no idea what we did, but THANK YOU for the suggestions!

amerrick

Participant

I am experiencing the same issue with a 400pp book file. I will make text edits or change a paragraph style and then there will be one (or multiple) mystery page breaks. I think it is a display or file corruption issue. The only way I have been able to fix is to re-thread the empty text frame...and then undo the operation (as I don't want hundreds of pages to reflow). Magically the text will move back to the text box it is supposed to fill.

Randy Hagan

Correct answer

Community Expert

Generally when people have odd, unexplainable page breaks I refer them to two areas where they often find the root of their problem:

Text Wrap

and

Keep Options

If there are graphic elements at/near the spot where a funky page break occurs, I recommend opening the Text Wrap panel, then using the Selection/Black Arrow tool to select graphics and InDesign-created elements and frames in the area of the unexpected page break. Very often one of those elements/frames has an unexpected text wrap setting which is throwing the text flow off the existing page and onto the next one. Don't forget to check Master Page Items if you've placed them in your document. You can't select them without extra effort on the document pages, but when you go to the applicable master page(s) those offending elements can be detected.

If you find any elements with an unexpected text wrap, turn the text wrap off and see if the text flows as you expect it to.

For text-based funky breaks, they generally come from odd Keep Options set in the Paragraph Style options box. Get your Text tool and place your cursor into the block of text before the page break, then open the Paragraph Styles panel and see which style, if any, has been applied to the paragraph. Pay special attention to whether the style shows a plus (+) sign after the style in the panel, which will show custom formatting has been applied to the paragraph. Go to the flyaway menu — the spot where three horizontal lines are in the upper-right of the panel, and select the Style Options... menu command to open the Paragraph Style Options box. On the left side, select the Keep Options box in the menu. Make sure that the Keep check boxes are not selected, and that the Paragraph: options box is set to Start Anywhere. Now click in the first line on the following page and do the same thing. Any settings in the Keep Options section can cause unpredictable results.

I'd say in the vast majority of cases, unpredictable page breaks are due to one of these two factors — like 95%+ of the time. If these are not a factor, plese share some screen shots of where you're getting strange results and we'll do our best to help you.

Hope this helps,

Randy

wizmosis

Known Participant

My student is having the same problem. He just sent me his document. I've taught InDesign since version 1.0 so I thought I would be able to troubleshoot. He created a paragraph style, and throughout the document there are many seemingly random text breaks, leaving big gaps on pages where there is plenty of room for more text. I turned on the hidden characters expecting to find some line breaks, possibly ones that came in when he imported the Word document.

But no, no line breaks are inserted. I even looked in Story Editor just to be sure.

Yes, I checked the Keep Options, and they're both unchecked. "Start Anywhere" is chosen.

I changed Adobe Composer to single-line but that didn't help.

There are no images in the document, and there are no mystery frames with text wrap. I checked. Just a single text box, margin to margin.

No excessive "Space Above" or "Space After"

I copied the text, and pasted it in a new InDesign document, but the problems persist. I'm really at a loss. Please help.

I'm at a loss. Align to Baseline grid is not on.

vladan saveljic

Inspiring

it would be better if you start new topic with your issue.

Can you share with us your file?

Frans v.d. Geest

Community Expert

Did you check the Keep and break options like keep lines and styles together? Did you check the Start on a new/even/uneven Page options? Baseline set to for margins instead of page?

Steve Werner

Community Expert

Is there a paragraph style applied which includes Keep Options? Is there a baseline grid applied to the text? Both of these features will cause seemingly sudden jumps in the text flow.

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