Skip to main content
November 16, 2019
Question

Paragraph Shading Text Width Not Justifying

  • November 16, 2019
  • 2 replies
  • 1297 views

I have three ¶Styles for indented shaded paragraphs. A first ¶ with space above, a middle ¶ without space above or below, and a last ¶ with space below. The shading is equally offset from the text the same on all styles. But I am seeing the right sides not having equal offset. Moreover it isn't consisitent — on one page the first and last are wider, and mid narrower, and on another page the opposite! What's happening? 

Above, the first shaded graph is First¶ style and then Last¶ style.  The second set of shaded graphs is First, Middle, Middle, Last. 

 

All the styless are using a .0625" offset. And all are using the same left and right indent on the text itself.

Has anyone run into this? Suggestions?

 

Um. Hmm. I pasted a snippet of text into a new doc to send, and the problem vanished. Pasting that text box back into my working doc and it stays nicely justified. But selecting the text (of the new test doc) and pasting that back into my original text flow—and it's uneven again! What the heck? 

I've included my test doc below. But the problem doesn't appear there. I should also say that the shaded graphs are not aligned to the 16 pt grid but the regular text is, and that's same as the original doc. It doesnt't seem to affect it whether it's aligned to grid or not.

 

This topic has been closed for replies.

2 replies

Community Expert
November 20, 2019

Hi Sue,

that's still an issue with InDesign 2020 version 15.0.0.155.

Hm. There is a workaround, but that would require to set the width of the shading to Column and do some offset values for left and right with negative numbers. A workaround that is not very flexible and will only work if you are always using the same width for text columns or text frames.

 

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

November 20, 2019

OK. I figured it out. I have Optical margin alignment ON. If I turn it off then these shaded graphs will properly align the right edge of the shading. This is unfortunate. I think optical margins is actually a REQUIRED feature in a well-typeset book and use that feature always. 

 

Any chance we can get this fixed? I will probably just use boxes instead—also unfortunate as these will have to be split manually across columns or pages. 

 

I am not able to update past the 13.1.1 build without buying a new computer. So hopefully it would be fixed retroactively.

 

Thanks,

Sue

 

Jongware
Community Expert
Community Expert
November 20, 2019

Well done tracking down the cause!

 

Looks like a genuine bug – the programmers did not test this. Report it at https://indesign.uservoice.com/forums/601180-adobe-indesign-bugs and hopefully it will be fixed in an interim patch (rather than "the next major version" or "never").