Moving all text frames

[detritus books]

I want to move all my text frames up just a tad. I presume I can do this with a Master Page, but not sure the easiest way to do it. At this point my Master Page does not have a text frame in it. Easiest way to accomplish this? CS6/Mac

[detritus books]

no one?

[Bill Silbert]

Are you talking about a document that has already been created without master pages? You'll have to provide more detail about the scope of what you're trying to do.

[detritus books]

It has Master Pages. As I said above, my Master Page does not have a text frame in it. It only has headers/page numbers.

[Bill Silbert · Accepted solution]

If you're talking about a file with already existing text frames on the document pages then creating text frames on the Master page will have no effect on those frames. The frames on the document pages would only be linked to the Master if they had been originally created on the Master. Even then once text had been flowed into the document page frames it would lose any link to any text that is in the Master Page text frames but could still be moved through the Master as long as the geometry and position of the document page text frames was not changed. Once any alteration to the size or position of a document page text frame has been made it would lose its link to the master.

As to your original question about moving the frames just a bit that might have to be done by selecting all the frames on the page and either nudging them up a "tad" using the arrow keys or by adding or subtracting a fixed amount in the X and/or Y coordinates in the Control Panel.

[detritus books]

Am I reading you right that each of the 300+ pages has to be nudged individually?

[Barb Binder]

Yes. Had you created primary frames on the master pages, you could have just moved those two frames, and the body pages would follow. For long documents, that is the way to go, for this specific reason.

[detritus books]

Is there any reason I couldn't start over, create text frames in the Master Pages, and then copy the text from the original into the new document?

[Barb Binder]

You can certainly do that. Additional considerations:

• Create primary text frames on the master page this time
• Copy running heads from the current document and Edit > Paste in Place to avoid having to recreate them
• Load All Text Styles into the new file through the Paragraph panel menu to maintain formatting
• Then copy the text from the current file, and auto-flow it into the new file

~Barb

[detritus books]

When I copy the text over, am I going to paste the text itself into a new text frame?

[detritus books]

Barb, going back to your method. I'm still a bit confused. You said:

"Then copy the text from the current file, and auto-flow it into the new file"

But I'm confused about a couple things. I made the A-Master have a text frame that is in the position I want the text frames to be in. But it seems I can't assign this frame to pages before adding the text?

When you say copy the text in, are you talking about just highlighting and then copy/pasting the actual text? Or am I placing the document? Do I need to create a text frame first in the place I want it to be?

[Barb Binder]

Highlight, copy and paste the text from the other file:

1. Add the primary text frames to the A-Master.
   
2. Navigate back to page 1.
3. You can't see the primary text frames on page 1, but InDesign can.
4. in the other file, click in the main story with the Type tool (the T).
5. Edit > Select all
6. Edit > Copy
7. Navigate back to page one in the new file
8. Now here's where it gets a little weird...
   1. With the Selection tool, Edit > Paste
   2. Click the red overset text icon in the bottom right corner to load the text cursor
      
   3. Press Delete to delete the small frame
   4. As you hover over the invisible-to-you primary text frame, InDesign shows you the parenthesis, indicating that it sees the primary frame from the master page under the cursor:
      
   5. Align the loaded text cursor with the top pink margin line. Press and hold the Shift key and click to auto-flow the entire story into the new file. InDesign will create as many pages as necessary to hold the new file.
      

[TᴀW]

There's a script that comes with InDesign called "Adjust Layout" (you'll find it in the Samples > Javascript folder in your scripts panel) that will allow you to nudge all frames upwards. Very easy to use.

Ariel

[detritus books]

I'm not seeing the scripts panel?

[Steve Werner]

Windows > Utilities > Scripts > Application > Samples > Javascript.

I've never used the script but when you select a frame and double-click on "Adjust Layout" you'll see the dialog below:

[detritus books]

Ok, I found the script, though I'm a little confused about the how-to...

I just want to raise all the text frames .0417 in, how would I work that in this dialog?

[detritus books]

Still trying to figure out how to select all of my text frames at once so I don't have to move ~300 of them individually...

[Laubender]

Hi,

how about a script that moves all text frames of all pages up by .0417 in ?

Here some code:

/*

ExtendScript ( JavaScript ) snippet

Scope:

Active document

All text frames on all document pages

Notes:

Text frames on masters are not affected.

Text frames on pasteboards are not affected.

*/

app.documents[0].pages.everyItem().textFrames.everyItem().

move

(

    // to parameter:

    undefined ,

    // by parameter:

    [

        0 , // x-direction

        "-0.0417in" // y-direction

    ]

);

FWIW: You cannot select all text frames in your document at once.
Just the ones on a single thread spread. By scripting we cannot do that either, but we can address all text frames at once.

At least the ones that are not nested. The ones that are not grouped, not pasted inside or not anchored…

Regards,
Uwe

[detritus books]

Wow, that seems cool, though I have no idea where I would put this coding...

[Laubender]

Copy and save the code to a text-only ( no formatting! ) text file with suffix .jsx.

And see how to store the file and run the code from InDesign:

Indiscripts :: Indiscripts for Dummies

The no-formatting part is essential.

E.g. straight quotes must stay straight quotes!

So prepare an empty text-only file before pasting the code.

Regards,
Uwe

[detritus books]

Hey Laubender, I've got TextMate and TextEdit, but don't see the option to save as .jsx in either. Am I missing something or is there another program I need to use?

[detritus books]

Ok never mind, I think I saved it as .jsx in TextEdit, though running it is whole other problem. I've never done this before so have no idea what I'm doing. Just gonna start over from the beginning...

[Laubender]

https://forums.adobe.com/people/left+bank+books  wrote

Ok never mind, I think I saved it as .jsx in TextEdit, though running it is whole other problem. I've never done this before so have no idea what I'm doing. Just gonna start over from the beginning...

Hi,

if you are using TextEdit you can toggle between formatted and not formatted text with cmd+t.
Saving as .jsx seems to be no problem for you. Just use this suffix instead of .txt.
BTW: Make sure that suffixes are shown in OS X Finder.

Where to place the jsx?
I gave you a link that is describing this very clearly, I think. Here again, read through this:

Indiscripts :: Indiscripts for Dummies

In InDesign go to menu Window > Utilities > Scripts to get the Scripts Panel visible.
You now see two folders. Right-click the one saying User and execute the option "Reveal in Finder".

That's the folder where you have to move your script to.

If done, the script is immediately available in the Scripts Panel under User.

Executing the script is just a double-click on the script in the Scripts Panel.

FWIW: At the end of the code you could add one line of code alerting you that the script has been run.

Just type in a new paragraph:

alert("Done!");

The alert message is the text between the two straight quotes.

Change it to your needs 🙂

Hope, that helps!

Uwe