#InDesign #typography Some times type pops out of the text frame, what is this called? Is there a way to detect or automatically fix it. Does it matter?
I have looked at the app.selection[0].lines[0].endHorizontalOffset, which seems to be clipped to the text frame.
It was suggested that I look at the optical settings, but these did not change the appearance.
If I export the frame the type is clipped.
Is this a bug?
*I have a motive this question, I have a plugin that can detect this effect. But, I would prefer a script.
26
Replies
I was hoping to find a script to detect and fix the pop outs.
Is there a reason you don’t want to use a text inset? Is the problem characters going outside of the text frame or are you trying to meterically align the characters? For example you want the serifs of the A and V to align with the N’s serif:
Guess the point is it's a text frames and you'd expect the text to stay inside that frame.
Is that much to ask for?
I think as a general rule I want alignments to be optical — kerning pairs adjust the spacing to make it look optically even. With left aligned body text I want the alignment to compensate for the empty space of the A and V:
The exception might be a large, 2 line headline where I manually override the optical alignment by tracking a space character
I have tested the
app.selection[0].lines[0].endHorizontalOffset
against the frame bounds, it just not report the 'popping' out bit. It is truncated to the bounds of the frame.
.endHorizontalOffset works for me. Try this on a selected character overhanging the right text frame bounds:
app.scriptPreferences.measurementUnit = MeasurementUnits.POINTS;
var s = app.activeDocument.selection[0];
if (s.constructor.name == "Character") {
var oh = s.endHorizontalOffset-s.parentTextFrames[0].geometricBounds[3]
alert ("Selected Character Overhang\r" + oh + " Points")
} else {
alert("Please Select a Single Character")
}
app.scriptPreferences.measurementUnit = AutoEnum.AUTO_VALUE;
I’m still not following what the problem with a text frame inset would be?
By @rob day
Even here - at the beginning have to set insets for top, bottom, left, right.
As accents, caps - dots on "i"'s go outside
Very basic example - all looks great and not going into text-free area.
This paragraph looks great - all insde the area now I have manually inserted 0.2mm on the right side.
Deletion required
Knockon effect - as the italic 'of' as come back to end of line.
Now the italic f even with 0.2mm inset has popped into the text free zone.
My question is quite simple.
Why a text frame does not 'frame' the text.
Why does a text frame allow parts of a character to pop out of the 'frame'?
It's a frame - it should all be inside it.
What happens now - increase the text inset again is the greatest solution I could come up with.
This can cause complete text reflow - resulting in overset text - resulting in reducing leading, tracking, scaling etc. to fit the content.
Which means when comparing a simple text change of remove 2 letters, all paragraphs on all pages end up with different line endings due to increased text insets.
Is it really too much to ask to have text to stay within it's frame?
To me it's a bug - others say it's not.
Imagine the uproar if parts of a place .ai image popped outside its graphic frame.
Hope this illustrates, in a simple way, what the issue is.
As accents, caps - dots on "i"'s go outside
That would depend on your First Baseline Offest preference—the xHeight, Ascent, etc, would be set by the type designer:
To me it's a bug - others say it's not.
You could try reporting it, but for me it’s a feature—I want the text to be optically aligned with the text frame’s bounds, so when it sits on a margin guide the text is optically aligned with the margin.
InDesign doesn’t have a hanging puncuation feature, but does have Optical Margin Alignment, which I think is better. I suppose there could be a feature request for when it’s turned off there’s no optical alignment and the outer most glyph bounds are used instead.
Good analysis. Without getting any more tangled up in semantic engineering, I concur that this whole argument seems to be over seeing the same, very established effect from two different perspectives and being upset because they're not the same. A text frame, whether digital or mechanical, is one thing; how certain letterforms behave at the edges of that frame, whether pixels or lead, is another. I suspect we'd find "popouts" in Gutenberg's work. 🙂
It's the notion of a strictly text-free zone that's new, and needs to be coped with.
ETA: Q.E.D. 😄
Hi @Pickory, I've put together a hacky script that shows (using blue rectangles) where each line of text protrudes from the selected text frame. I know this is probably not much use to you (because it doesn't fix anything), but because I've just written a very similar to a script I may as well share it. As I said, it's a quick hack—it literally duplicates the text frame and outlines it—so if you can use the SDK, then that would be much preferable.
- Mark
/*
* Reveal protruding lines of text frame.
* Known limitation: because it duplicates the text frame,
* this will sometimes cause a reflow if a paragraph using
* a multi-line composer spans multiple text frames.
* @author m1b
* @discussion https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign-discussions/type-popping-out-of-text-frame/m-p/13711048
*/
function main() {
var doc = app.activeDocument,
textFrame = doc.selection[0];
if (
textFrame == undefined
|| !textFrame.isValid
|| textFrame.constructor.name !== 'TextFrame'
) {
alert('Please select a text frame and try again.');
return;
}
var results = getProtrudingCharacterBounds(textFrame, layer);
if (!results) return;
// put the rectangles on this layer
var layerName = 'Protruding';
var layer = doc.layers.itemByName(layerName)
if (!layer.isValid)
layer = doc.layers.add({ name: layerName, printable: false });
doc.activeLayer = layer;
for (var i = 0; i < results.length; i++) {
// draw a rectangle just for showing the results
var rect = textFrame.parentPage.rectangles.add({
geometricBounds: results[i],
fillColor: doc.swatches[4],
});
rect.transparencySettings.blendingSettings.opacity = 30;
}
alert('Found ' + results.length + ' protruding glyphs.');
};
app.doScript(main, ScriptLanguage.JAVASCRIPT, undefined, UndoModes.ENTIRE_SCRIPT, 'Mark Protruding Text');
/**
* Returns bounds of the protruding
* parts of lines of text frame.
* @param {TextFrame} tf - an Indesign TextFrame.
* @returns {Array<Array>} - array of [T, L, B, R] arrays.
*/
function getProtrudingCharacterBounds(tf) {
app.scriptPreferences.measurementUnit = MeasurementUnits.POINTS;
// get the outermost textframe
while (tf.parent.constructor.name == 'Character')
tf = tf.parent.parentTextFrames[0];
var bounds = tf.geometricBounds;
// duplicate text frame
var dup = tf.duplicate();
outlines = dup.createOutlines();
// add outlines of anchored text frames
while (outlines[outlines.length - 1].textFrames.length > 0)
outlines.push(outlines[outlines.length - 1].textFrames[0].createOutlines()[0]);
// find the protruding outlines
var found = [];
outlinesLoop:
for (var i = 0; i < outlines.length; i++) {
var polygons;
if (outlines[i].constructor.name == 'Polygon')
// we get a Polygon if there is only one character in text frame
polygons = [outlines[i]];
else if (outlines[i].hasOwnProperty('polygons'))
// a Group with polygons
polygons = outlines[i].polygons;
else
continue;
for (var j = 0; j < polygons.length; j++) {
var r = getProtrudingRect(bounds, polygons[j].visibleBounds, 3);
if (r)
found = found.concat(r);
}
}
// delete all the outlines
for (var i = outlines.length - 1; i >= 0; i--)
outlines[i].remove();
if (dup.isValid)
// sometimes the duplicate is left behind
// eg. when there is a table in the text frame
dup.remove();
if (found)
return found;
};
/**
* Returns the protruding part of a rectangle.
* @param {Array<Number>} r1 - [T,L,B,R].
* @param {Array<Number>} r2 - [T,L,B,R].
* @param {Number} [offset] - the amount to expand resulting rectangle (default: 0).
* @returns {Array<Number>} [T,L,B,R].
*/
function getProtrudingRect(r1, r2, offset) {
offset = offset || 0;
var results = [];
var top1 = r1[0], top2 = r2[0],
left1 = r1[1], left2 = r2[1],
bottom1 = r1[2], bottom2 = r2[2],
right1 = r1[3], right2 = r2[3];
if (
bottom1 <= top2 || top1 >= bottom2 || right1 <= left2 || left1 >= right2
|| (left2 >= left1 && right2 <= right1 && top2 >= top1 && bottom2 <= bottom1)
) {
// No overlap between the rectangles, or second
// rectangle is completely within the first.
return;
}
// handle cases where protrudes from both sides
if (top1 > top2 && bottom1 < bottom2) {
results = results.concat(getProtrudingRect([top1, left1, bottom2, right1], r2, offset));
results = results.concat(getProtrudingRect([top2, left1, bottom1, right1], r2, offset));
return results;
}
if (left1 > left2 && right1 < right2) {
results = results.concat(getProtrudingRect([top1, left1, bottom1, right2], r2, offset));
results = results.concat(getProtrudingRect([top1, left2, bottom1, right1], r2, offset));
return results;
}
// Define the outside rectangle.
var outside = [top2, left2, bottom2, right2];
// Check for overlap on each side and adjust the outside rectangle accordingly.
if (left1 > left2) {
outside[1] = left2;
outside[3] = left1;
}
if (right1 < right2) {
outside[1] = right1;
outside[3] = right2;
}
if (top1 > top2) {
outside[0] = top2;
outside[2] = top1;
}
if (bottom1 < bottom2) {
outside[0] = bottom1;
outside[2] = bottom2;
}
// expand by offset (just for better
// visibility of tiny protrusions)
outside[0] -= offset;
outside[1] -= offset;
outside[2] += offset;
outside[3] += offset;
return [outside];
};
Edit 2023-04-11: now puts indicators on a new, non-printing layer, to keep them separate from artwork. @Eugene Tyson.
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