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June Rabbit
June Rabbit
Known Participant
February 18, 2023
Answered

Why does my InDesign file now have gibberish text?

  • February 18, 2023
  • 2 replies
  • 3055 views

 

This text was real text, but now it is just gibberish. What is going on here, and how can it be fixed?

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer James Gifford—NitroPress

So this is strange, but when reopening the same file and updating the same text groups with the missing font, it worked this time without any issue. I didn't update Adobe programs or my computer. It just works now.


Gremlins.

 

I think there may have been a simple glitch that caused ID to read a font file wrong, so that the character indexing was off by some value. (Ever use the ROT-13 encryption technique, where it just jumps each letter 13 places along the alphabet? Something like that.)

 

Glad you fixed it, or scared it into fixing itself. 🙂

 

2 replies

Barb Binder
Community Expert
Barb BinderCommunity Expert
Community Expert
February 18, 2023

Hi @June Rabbit:

 

It happens to me on a regular basis. I just navigate ahead a page, and then back to check it. It's always fine. I'm starting to desensitize to it. Try disabling GPU Performance in Preferences >  GPU Performance. That fixes other glitchy text stuff, so I tend to turn it off for teaching/demos. But I keep it on otherwise, so that may be a contributing factor.

 

~Barb

~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
    James Gifford—NitroPress
    James Gifford—NitroPress
    Legend
    February 18, 2023

    It looks like a font or language mapping error. Did you work in or import from another language? Are each of those paragraph styles set to use English? Does the problem remain if you substitute a vanilla font like Minion?

     

    June Rabbit
    June RabbitAuthor
    Known Participant
    February 18, 2023

    I've only worked in English and never changed to another language in any Adobe software. It looks the same even when switching to a default font.

    James Gifford—NitroPress
    James Gifford—NitroPress
    Legend
    February 18, 2023

    I'm baffled, not by just the gibberish but that it's selective — your headings and lead-in style are fine. So it has to be something affecting only those styles (what appears to be body and the regular bullet text).

     

    It's not likely to help, but try the overall "corruption fix" of exporting the file to IDML, then opening it and saving as a different INDD file. It might be some very subtle glitch in the style mapping that this might fix.

     

    (I used to write about fax systems quite a bit... haven't seen anything about them for years!)

     

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