We made a script that imports an XML with a decent amount of data and a lot of tables. We sometimes have about 300-400 cells that contain pictures of varying size, so we add the row height as attributes to the cells in the XML to change the height and turn those into graphic cells : (Note the rowHeight attribute)
<OrganeTableauPhotos xmlns:aid="http://ns.adobe.com/AdobeInDesign/4.0/" aid:table="table" aid:trows="2" aid:tcols="3">
<CellPicture rowHeight="43mm" aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="136.06299212592387">
<Image href="file:///C:/Job/36d2bcfe-a858-4323-89f5-ce3c550da621/e8ccd3b7-0cf2-4b08-a4c9-d5c496961a8d.jpg"></Image>
</CellPicture>
<CellPicture rowHeight="43mm" aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="136.06299212592387">
<Image href="file:///C:/Job/36d2bcfe-a858-4323-89f5-ce3c550da621/2ca2bd71-6082-495f-8484-4f916aca76ff.jpg"></Image>
</CellPicture>
<CellPicture rowHeight="43mm" aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="136.06299212592387">
<Image href="file:///C:/Job/36d2bcfe-a858-4323-89f5-ce3c550da621/1b79f38b-ddff-4a1a-9c22-14c9db0899d1.jpg"></Image>
</CellPicture>
<CellPictureLegend aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="136.06299212592387">
<OrganeLegendePhoto>Photo 1</OrganeLegendePhoto>
</CellPictureLegend>
<CellPictureLegend aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="136.06299212592387">
<OrganeLegendePhoto>Photo 2</OrganeLegendePhoto>
</CellPictureLegend>
<CellPictureLegend aid:table="cell" aid:crows="1" aid:ccols="1" aid:ccolwidth="136.06299212592387">
<OrganeLegendePhoto>Photo 3</OrganeLegendePhoto>
</CellPictureLegend>
</OrganeTableauPhotos>
And therefore after the import, the script goes through the cells that have this attribute and :
- Sets the appropriate rowHeight on the parent
- Converts the cell to a Graphic Cell
- Fits the graphic neatly into the cell (to keep the proportions)
var elements = activeDocument.stories.everyItem().tables.everyItem().rows.everyItem().cells.everyItem().getElements()
for (var i = 0; i < elements.length; i++) {
var hasRowHeight = false
var el = elements[i]
var val = el.associatedXMLElement.xmlAttributes.itemByName("rowHeight")
if (!val.isValid)
continue;
if (val.isValid) {
hasRowHeight = true
var size = val.value
el.parentRow.height = size
el.parentRow.maximumHeight = size
el.parentRow.keepWithNextRow = true
}
// Switch the cell type to Graphic
el.convertCellType(CellTypeEnum.GRAPHIC_TYPE_CELL, true)
if (el.allGraphics.length > 0) {
var rect = el.rectangles.firstItem().getElements()[0]
var graphic = el.allGraphics[0]
graphic.fit(FitOptions.PROPORTIONALLY);
activeDocument.align([graphic], AlignOptions.LEFT_EDGES, AlignDistributeBounds.KEY_OBJECT, rect)
activeDocument.align([graphic], AlignOptions.VERTICAL_CENTERS, AlignDistributeBounds.KEY_OBJECT, rect)
}
}
The issue we're having is that sometimes the document is quite big (90+ pages, 400+ pictures) it can take 30 minutes to do this step, or even crash InDesign altogether, because resizing each graphic cell/picture individually then - we assume - reflows the whole document, and it takes about 3-5 seconds per cell, while on a small document (3 to 10 pages) it only takes about 15s
What we have noticed and are pretty sure of :
- There is no way to set the row height from the XML, it needs to be done from a script
- Elements like the Image in our example XML cannot be mapped to Object Styles in the Tags-to-styles mapping, so we also need to apply those align/fit options through the script
- Even if in our InDesign Template we have graphic cells, once we import the tables, the cells go back to being text cells, so we need to convert them back to graphic cells from the script
Does anyone have an idea on how to improve this workflow ?
Thanks
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