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Word import reverses character order, but not all of it

Explorer ,
Jan 29, 2021 Jan 29, 2021

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Here is a stunning new bug for Adobe. When importing a word docx with some tabbed names in a column, some of the names come in with the letters in reverse order. example: Robin King becomes gniK niboR. Copying the text in does the same thing. Saving the Word file in different formats and importing does the same thing. Opeing the Word file in any other progrma or format looks normal. Importing the Word file into Quark works just fine.

 

In InDesign, if you select all the copy in the text box, you can see highlighted blocks OUTSIDE the text box in line with the reversed copy!

 

Any thoughts?

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Bug , Import and export

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Community Expert ,
Jan 29, 2021 Jan 29, 2021

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Need more information: Please tell us what operating system (exactly) you're running. Please tell us (exactly) what InDesign version you're using. Attach a screen capture.

 

It sounds like likely a corrupted file if it's only happening in one document: Save as IDML, Reopen the IDMl file.

 

If happening to more than one file, restore your preferenes ane caches:

 

Adobe InDesign: Rebuilding Preferences and Cache Files ...www.rockymountaintraining.com › Adobe InDe...

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Explorer ,
Jan 29, 2021 Jan 29, 2021

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Hi Steve,

 

Yes, I did leave out some information, although only useful if I were a basic user. This happened on mutiple macs and pcs, startin with fresh blank single page documents.

 

Since my initial post we discovered that expanding the width of the text box out to the edges of the pasteboard made the text appear correctly. Still odd.

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Community Expert ,
Jan 29, 2021 Jan 29, 2021

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The extra info is always useful when we don't understand the workflow and whether other devices are also affected. Glad you seem to have solved the issue. Yes, it is odd.

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Explorer ,
Jan 29, 2021 Jan 29, 2021

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To be clear though, not solved. When we close the box back up from 30"+ to 8.5", the text goes awry once again. If anyone else has thoughts, please share.

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Community Expert ,
Jan 29, 2021 Jan 29, 2021

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Is this a file (or a part of it) that could be shared with problem solvers on this forum?

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Explorer ,
Feb 01, 2021 Feb 01, 2021

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I can 'sanitize' it a bit and provide the first page. I haven't shared a file here before, so not sure of the best method.

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Explorer ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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Here is a test sample of the file we are seeing this issue with if anyone wants to test it out. FYI, we are on Catalina and Win10, no Big Sur. I expect people will point at the Word file, but we have placed this copy in multiple other programs and had no issues as part of our troubleshooting/curiousity. Thanks!

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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I only have time for a quick check: I downloaded your test files. I see the problem on page 1 you descibed.

 

I'm working in InDesign 2021 16.1 (new update) and Big Sur 11.2 (latest version).

 

I placed the Word document on page 2 and could replicate the problem.

 

I'd suggest posting the problem on InDesign User Voice, where the engineers can look at it. Include the files you sent me and an explanation.

 

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

 

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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The corruption seems to be with the overridden MS Word styles that have been imported into the InDesign document. The 3 paragraphs have hundreds of tabs spaces. If I import the docx file without the Word styles the words are not reversed. There are only two styles coming from Word, and all of the text is styled as Normal, so it doesn’t seem like you need to import styles:

 

Screen Shot 7.pngScreen Shot 8.png

 

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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I  looked at Anne-Marie Conception's excellent Linkedin Learning class, "Word and InDesign: Integration". On one section, she talks about a Microsoft approved method of removing corruption in the Word file called "maggying" I used the method she recommended, and could not find corruption in the Word file itself.

 

So I think Rob is probably correct.

 

 

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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Also, the conflict with the overridden Word Normal style seems to be the Adobe Paragraph Composer. Select all of the text and set the paragraph composer to Adobe World-Ready Single-line:

 

style.pngstyle2.png

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Guide ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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see hidden characters in your file. It contains too many spaces and too many tabulators.

(Why? Copied from internet?)

 

Schermata 2021-02-04 alle 16.56.25.png

Import this text into Indesign and with grep find and replace:

find: \x20+ change to: 1 space

find: \t+ change to \t

find \t change to \r

After these three click your text in InDesign will be ok

 

 

 

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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The style corruption seems to be happening with the strings of spaces—if I remove them and leave the tabs I get this:

 

Screen Shot 12.png

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Explorer ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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Thanks to all who chimed in, much appreicated.

I can't say how this copy got into Word, but we receiveed it as a docx file. The spaces do appear to be the reason InDesign is messing with the type. The question for Adobe is "Why?" So they have a lot of spaces (and tabs) but, so what? We should just get them imported with the rest of the characters.

 

At least we know where to look look if we see this problem again, so thanks for the help!

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Community Expert ,
Feb 04, 2021 Feb 04, 2021

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If this is a bug I wouldn’t expect to see it fixed anytime soon, but it seems to be happening with multiple combinations of extra long strings of spaces and tabs, in a single paragraph, interacting with the paragraph composer choice of Adobe Paragraph Composer. The paragraph composer considers the entire paragraph when setting line breaks, so the Adobe Paragraph Composer doesn’t handle the multiple space tab combinations as expected.

 

If I switch to Adobe World Paragraph Composer and look at the Steve King instance, I can see there are 143 spaces after King followed by a Tab. If I delete 142 of the spaces, and switch back to Adobe Paragraph Composer the text is not reversed.

 

Adobe World Paragraph Composer:

 

Screen Shot 16.png

 

With Adobe Paragraph Composer and the extra spaces removed, Steve King does not reverse but Pat McMaun does

 

Screen Shot 18.png

 

 

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