Endnotes to Footnotes conversion (InD 2020)

[l0udgr4c3]

Hi all.

The article about this deals with endnotes that have no paragraph overrides (e.g. italicised titles). Tried to set my doc footnote and endnote options to exactly the same settings and convert from end to foot which is fine until it gets converted, where everything gets wiped to naked, unformatted text.

Tried to find and use Peter Kharel's script (my previous workaround, for which I have been very grateful) but I here get:

Suggestions anyone?

Warmest Regards.

[maxwithdax]

Your end notes are controlled by the Endnote Options. Type>Document Endnote Options. I would set my styles there before converting. Let us know if you are still having issues.

[l0udgr4c3]

Hi MaxwithDax,

Hope this finds you well.

I have set the styles below so that they match up but as I mentioned earlier, the conversion doesn't cater for style overrides like all the italics in each line, which I lose when I hit convert. Call me lazy but I'm not keen on manually highlighting all the titles and italicising them again in the footnotes after conversion when they have already been correctly placed.

Hope this helps. Do let me know if you find something else I can try. Many thanks in advance!

[maxwithdax]

Okay now I understand your issue. What you need here is a "Nested style." You are right, conversion will not carry forward overrides. You will have to build a nested style that accomplished the format you are looking for.

[Laubender]

Hi l0udgr4c3,

is the italic text formatted with an applied character style?

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[l0udgr4c3]

Hi Uwe Laubender,

no it isn't 😞

Warmest Regards,

Megan

[Laubender · Accepted solution]

Hi Megan,

did you try to apply a character style first and then convert the endnote to footnote?

Would that work? If yes, you could search for italic text with Find/Change and apply a character style for italic in one go all over the story with all endnotes.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[Linda Gus]

Hi Uwe and all,

I too have had painful experiences with this. InsSeveral projects.

The first conversion from footnotes to endotes, the italics seemed fine. But when I needed to export the content as Word manuscript, the export didn't include the endnotes. So then I had to convert the endnotes back to footnotes, tried exporting, ... and finally noticed that all the italics were gone!! Start again ... after many lost hours. 

Another project, the italics disappeared when, because after the first page draft, the client wanted the endnotes to start at 1 at the beginning of each chapter, I had to convert the endnotes back to footnotes, copy/paste out each chapter as separate stories, then re-convert the footnotes back to endnotes, shipped the job out (over 400 pages ... ) and it was then the editor that noticed that the italics had disappeared. 

So I had to go back to the old file, apply character style tags for all italics and small caps, figure out all the changes I had made in the interim (by exporting the text, and running Compare in Word, then manually re-doing all the changes), re-convert all the endnotes back to footnotes, cut the manuscript up into individual chapters, re-paste them all into separate stories, re-convert all the footnotes back to endnotes, type in all the chapter title subheads into the endnotes ... a lot of extra work. 

While I'm really grateful to Adobe for incorporating Peter Karel's script into InDesign, can't it include a script to retain local formatting? We stopped needing to apply character-level style tags years ago. It's a surprise now to have to start doing it again.  

Thanks a lot!

Linda

[Laubender]

"While I'm really grateful to Adobe for incorporating Peter Karel's script into InDesign, can't it include a script to retain local formatting?"

Hi Linda,

I'm pretty sure, no, I'm absolutely sure, that the developers did not incorporate Peter Kahrel's script.

For my workflow I developed my own script for inhouse purposes. I had enough time spent to report bugs with InDesign's own conversion process for footnotes and endnotes, that are not fixed yet.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[Linda Gus]

Hi Uwe,

Wow you are a power user! Me, although I can use scripts, it's a bit like closing my eyes, wiggling my nose, and hoping it works. 

Thanks for being at the leading edge, and sending comments to Adobe, and for taking the time to reply to this. I was trying to find a way to send Adobe this feedback, but ended up in this forum. When I saw "Adobe Community Professional" I thought that you worked for Adobe. 

1. Would you recommend going back to Peter Karel's script, instead of Adobe's for now?

2. Could you send me the link where I can send my above message directly to Adobe? Sorry that I am not a great searcher. 

Thanks!

Linda

[Linda Gus]

Uwe, 

I just saw your other post to my endnote numbering question, I'll follow up on those links to Adobe. 

While I am not a power coder, I have been using InDesign since InDesign 2.0 (and owned InDesign 1.0!) to produce large book projects, so have a pretty clear idea of what I need to get the job done. 

Thanks again!

Linda

[Laubender]

Hi Linda,

if you feel more comfortable, yes, go back to Peter Kahrel's script(s).

Bug reports can be done at Adobe InDesign UserVoice:

https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601180-adobe-indesign-bugs

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[Linda Gus]

Thanks Uwe for the link.

Which would you recommend in the meantime, InDesign's function, or Peter Karel's script?

Best,

Linda

[l0udgr4c3]

Hi all,

Hope this finds you well. 

Thanks for your input MaxwithDax & Uwe. I did have to make a new character style as MaxwithDax noted but it didn't have to be nested? Did as Uwe suggested with the Find/Change and that wasn't as bad as I thought it might have been.

Thanks again everyone!

Warmest Regards,

Megan.