When I import a new RTF into Indesign my custom workspace won't work

[Richard38213849xt3l]

I am trying to convert an RTF file into a reflowable ePub using InDesign.  I had formerly created a new ePub following Anne-Marie Concepcion's video tutorials and in that new file of mine I set a new Workspace, names it, and populated it with new paragraph and chracter styles and so on.  The workspace works beuatifully in that file.  But when I created a "new document" in Indesign, it has the name of my customized workspace (the one that I customized in the other file) at the very top of the workspace just as I expect to, as if it is working, but when I open the panels for paragraphs and characterstyles, it is as if I have never created a workspace at all.  It only shows blank_paragraphs as an option.  Can someone help, ...please?

Thanks,  Rick Reiman

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

I can't see this as being EPUB related at all.

Hazarding a guess, you need to set your custom workspace while no document is open, and it should then persist across docs. (It is not a doc-specific setting.)

There have been reported glitches about this, though, and resetting your ID preferences might straighten things out. Do a quick search to find the method for your version and platform.

[Richard38213849xt3l]

Thank you, sir. I will try these steps and see if they work!

Rick

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

Here's a summary of how to reset InDesign settings etc. when needed:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/indesign-discussions/reset-indesign-preferences-and-other-troubleshoo...

(Sorry, I was on a glass screen for the first post and don't have the patience to try and juggle multiple windows to find links etc. on them. 🙂 )

Workspace settings should be persistent across sessions, projects and details like project "focus." They are not project or doc specific. But there are occasionally glitches such as you report, and it usually boils down to corrupted preferences. So resetting those, and occasionally things like clearing ID's cache, are useful tools to have at hand.

[Richard38213849xt3l]

Thank you! I tried to fix this with your first suggestions and could not find any preferences settings in the Indesign introductions preview for Workspace.  In my original file some weeks ago I created a Workspace called "ePub Workspace Settings," and now it always sits at the top of the Indesign interface. If I select another workspace setting, it disappears, but when I come back to the setting at the top of the page, "ePubl Workspace settings" is always the default to choose at the top. But even when I select it, my paragraph and character styles are as empty as before. If I go back to the original file from within which I created the "ePub Workspace" setting, it works just fine, but only on and for that original file.  I will try your new suggestions and am very grateful for them.

Rick

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

Very much sounds like corrupted preferences, which in general mean "InDesign will work perfectly, if you don't mind it being possessed by malicious little gremlins helping you."

Clearing preferences is a startup operation, not an internal menu element or command; it varies slightly with version and which platform you're on. See that linked post and it will walk you through the steps.

[Richard38213849xt3l]

Mr. Gifford,

This is also helpful but no solution yet. I had just come to the conclusions that it was a "preferences" issue, but I was still stuck on the idea that it was a menu problem.  I have the latest version of ID-- I will see how to clear out its' cache.  I also wonder why my preferential "workspace" is stuck as the default? I must have selected it to stay there, which is fine, but it seems to make no difference as it does not work with any new files. (I thought if I switched to another default workspace, I could switch back and it would work, but that didn't work either).  I will try more of those preference options in your link to the preferences.  Thanks,

Rick

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

If I wasn't clear, the gliltches and odd behavior caused by corrupted preferences can be maddeningly erratic and unpredictable; it's often not a matter of something obvious being wrong, just a whac-a-mole game of features and menus and settings not working right. So don't look too hard at any one element of this, such as your custom workspace or why it plays hide and seek or won't persist. It's not a rational thing. 🙂

[Richard38213849xt3l]

I have tried just about everything.  I have a brand new mac with plenty of space on it and a brand new download of InDesign (as of last month). I deleted all the preferences with the 4-keystroke method on opening ID, and I used the new feature of User Preferences> download.  I ran into this problem two summers ago, and I just gave up and left InDesign for a couple of years.  Here it is again.  I am more dedicated to this now. I am thinking aboul resetting the custom workspace preference, which may break my old epub dile design,  and then I will have to create the paragraph and charachter styles from scratch and reapply them.  The deterrent is that I may end up where I am now. The funny thing is that the scripts panel is displaying from the custom workspace but not the paragraph and character styles. It is almost as if the workspace feature is half-working, which computers aren't supposed to do (?)

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

I'm  quite confused. Your user-interface workspace setting and configuration have absolutely nothing to do with any aspect of any document. You should be able to switch to any standard setting in  Window | Workspace, and/ or rearrange your UI palettes and menus any way you like (saved in a custom workspace or not) without it having the slightest effect on your project. It certainly will not mess up your layout, your styles or anything else.

Starting from scratch and using very small words for my benefit, what is the EXACT problem you are seeing?

[leo.r]

As far as I understand, @Richard38213849xt3l  expects that if he defines his paragraph and character styles in one document, they become part of the Workspace and therefore should appear in the palettes when he creates new documents. 

Which, obviously, won't happen.

But let's first get confirmation that my assumption is correct.

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

On re-reading the OP, I think you're exactly right.

@Richard38213849xt3l, you are confusing setup of the application and UI with the setup of each document. They have (almost) nothing to do with each other. Styles and other document-related things are stored only in each document (with a sort of complicated exception we'll ignore). When you set up all the styles etc. for a document, they are saved in that document and completely "leave the building" when you close it. Opening a new document will present you with the very basic few styles that are integral to new documents, not any you created for another doc.

You can create documents and save them as templates, so that you open that template and have a new document with a starting layout, styles, settings etc. but that 's a very specific separate workflow and process, not the way things work for opening a new, blank doc.

I think you might be seeing ID in the way Word and other apps work, where styles and changes to styles are saved in a common template/file, so that each new document has access to those styles. With the exception of a few sophisticated processes, ID doesn't work that way. And none of this has anything to do with UI workspaces at all.

If you want to create a new document modeled on your prior EPUB source, open that document, delete everything that's specific to it (most content, I would assume, and any special/one-shot styles. Tidy it up, add any common new styles or starting content you want... and save it as an InDesign template. (Option in the Save-As menu; it will create an INDT file.)

Close it, then open that template file, and you will have a new, unsaved document containing exactly the styles and starting content you set.

[Richard38213849xt3l · Accepted solution]

Thanks very much! I called Adobe in my perplexity, and they said each of the points you say here. They showed me how to remove all pages but one from the original file where I created the styles and workplace, save it as a template, and use it for future new files.  I completely misread the nature of workspaces, which have a lot less utility and heft than I supposed. Now I get it! And templates will have the same utility for me that I believed workspaces would have, just a different workflow. Thanks for your help!

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

Great! It's frustrating how often a bend in terminology can derail a discussion. Now that I read your original post with this clue, you actually asked a pretty good question, but focusing on "workspace" sent it off into the rough.

Come on back if you get past the A-B-Cs of E-P-U-Bs and we'll see if we can have some more terminology fun. 🙂

[Richard38213849xt3l]

6:01 PM (4 minutes ago)

That is exactly what I supposed. I am less impressed with the value of workspaces now,  but relieved that templates do the job I thought workspaces were supposed to do. I have no idea why I thought as I did—obviously, though, I didn’t understand the template concept. Thanks for your helpful response. This is a terrific forum.

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

Workspaces are tremendously useful. They have nothing to do with the document, but allow you to set up any level of complexity (or compactness) of the entire ID user interface, then save that setup for restoration or recall later, and switch between setups optimized for different tasks. All apps should have such a feature, really. But yes, assuming it had something to do with document management might make it seem flawed. It's not.

I work on a massive 49-inch monitor and have probably 80% of ID's palettes and menus spread out for ready access, around a very generous primary doc window. It would take forever to set that up each time, and unnecessary hassle to fix if it gets messed up. But one click on my custom workspace setting, and there it is. And I can switch to a very compact workspace, not much larger than the document screen, when I am doing other kinds of work.