How can I access story editor data from textframes in a script?

[peter-g]

Hi there,

In inDesign, you can right click on textframes and edit with Story Editor, which shows you a view into not just the contents but the tags and styling for that particular textframe. I'm wondering how that data can be extracted from a TextFrame object in a script. Looking over the API docs, one thing I've found is item.ObjectExportOption.actualText() which I expected to be the XML text, but that returns a blank for me. Is this the correct place to look, and if so, why might I be getting blanks?

If the Story Editor data is not accessible in the API, then what is another way you would suggest to extract styling and format info from textFrames?

Thanks!

[brianp311]

Not sure what other tags you're after but you can get an array of all the paragraph styles used in a frame with: 

frame.paragraphs.everyItem().appliedParagraphStyle.name;

You can also iterate through each paragraph with: 

var pars = frame.paragraphs;
for (var i = 0; i < pars.length; i++) {
   alert(pars[i].appliedParagraphStyle.name);
}

Take a look at the TextFrame DOM to see all the ways you can dig into it: https://www.indesignjs.de/extendscriptAPI/indesign-latest/#TextFrame.html

[peter-g]

Thanks for your response,

This allows me to grab the style associated with a paragraph which is great, but what I also need to do is grab the HTML code for the paragraph. When exporting to HTML in InDesign everything is bundled into one giant file, but I'm wondering if theres a way to grab HTML chunks for sub-sections (by page, paragraph... anything deeper than the whole document).

For context, I'm trying to write a modified (hopefully better) version of the built-in, undocumented InDesign to HTMLFXL exporter. That exporter generates HTML files for each page. I'm wondering if my script will have to manually check each pageItem's page, cross reference the single-document exported HTML and split it accordingly. Hopefully the API lets users grab HTML subsections directly, but thats what I've been unable to find information on.

Thanks!

[Dirk Becker]

I'm not doing much with InCopy, but just tested - the XML Structure works the same way as in InDesign.

E.g. to get the tag name of the first story:

app.documents.item(0).stories.item(0).associatedXMLElement.markupTag.name

[peter-g]

Thanks for your response,

If possible check out my reply to brianp311 and let me know your thoughts 🙂

[Peter Kahrel]

What you see in the story editor is also accessible in the plain, normal, text. The story editor is just a different view of the document. It's a bit like Reveal Codes in WordPerfect. Codes are visible in a different way: in the main text, XML tags are brackets, in the story editor they're 'proper' tags with a name; footnotes are shown where they are cued; etc. Therefore there is no separate API for the story editor.

[peter-g]

Thanks for your response,

If possible check out my reply to brianp311 and let me know your thoughts! 🙂

[Peter Kahrel]

You can copy any stretch of text into a new text frame (or a new document) and export that to HTML. And if you don't like InDesign's HTML code you could write your own converter. 

[peter-g]

Is it possible to export InDesign's HTML code from a single textFrame? Your response suggests that it is, but I've not been able to find a way to do that unfortunately

[Peter Kahrel]

Ah, no. HTML export is a document property. So you copy a text frame to another document and export that.

[Laubender]

Hi peter-g,

to answer your question about the Story Editor Window in ExtendScript ( JavaScript ) code:

var doc = app.documents[0];

var allOpenStoryWindows = doc.storyWindows.everyItem().getElements();

for( var n=0; n<allOpenStoryWindows.length; n++ )
{
	// Select all text in the story window:
	allOpenStoryWindows[n].select( SelectAll.ALL );
	
	// Add a new document:
	var newDoc = app.documents.add();
	
	// Add a new text frame:
	var newTextFrame = newDoc.textFrames.add({ geometricBounds : newDoc.pages[0].bounds });
	
	// Duplicate the selected text to the new document's text frame:
	allOpenStoryWindows[n].selection[0].duplicate
	(
		LocationOptions.AFTER , 
		newTextFrame.parentStory.insertionPoints[0]
	);
	
	/*
		THEN:
		Export to HTML or do something else.
		Then close the temp doc without saving.
	*/

	newDoc.close( SaveOptions.NO );
	
};

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )