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*** DesignGeek ***
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Tips and techniques for the digital designer
In this issue:
-- Adobe Publishing Conference w/HerGeekness
-- Update PDFs Without Losing Links
-- Text Frame Threading Tricks in InDesign
Issue 23, 6//29/04
Written by Anne-Marie "HerGeekness" Concepcion
... for her clients, colleagues, random contacts and interested subscribers
© 2004 Seneca Design & Training, Inc.
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Adobe Publishing Conference with HerGeekness
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If you work in the design/publishing field, use any Adobe software product, and are within spitting distance of Chicago, this conference is for you. Even if you're not blessed to work/live on the "best coast," pay attention, because the conference may be hitting a town by you in the future.
Adobe is debuting their first "Partners in Publishing" Conference and Expo in Chicago from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday, July 13, 2004, and you're all invited at no charge, though you do have to sign up.
Official details, full agenda and attendee registration:
http://adobe.regsvc.com/tk/?site=430g
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Good News
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Did I say it's free? Including a complimentary lunch for attendees? And they're giving away prizes. Also, oh yeah, you can learn something about Adobe software; there's some great seminars (details below).
Plus when the seminars get boring, you can check out all the new, cool plug-ins, add-ons and support services for the Adobe Creative Suite software because local and national "partners," including yours truly, will be set up at tables in the expo hall.
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Best News
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This is not your typical Adobe marketing event, where "seminars" are actually local reps running through the software. (Hey, I love those guys, they're entertaining and they know their stuff, but if I have to see Nested Styles demo'd with that same old brochure one more time, I'll keel over.)
Instead, speakers will be actual end users -- people from Land's End, Quarasan, Young & Rubicam and others -- telling it like it really is, as well as "industry pundits" who seldom make it over to our neck of the woods.
Check out these seminars:
-- Russ Brown, one of the original developers of Photoshop, and currently Adobe Creative Director (okay I guess you could call him a rep), will do a seminar called "Adobe Photoshop CS: The Russell Brown Power Hour." I've heard him speak before and can assure you that *this seminar alone* is reason enough to attend the conference.
-- Lynda Weinman of lynda.com and the H.O.T. training videos is presenting "From Print to Web with GoLive CS." I have every one of her Designing Web Graphics books. I thought she was a Dreamweaver gal, so it'll be interesting hearing what she has to say about my favorite web authoring program.
-- Mordy Golding, past Illustrator product manager and current author and pre-press consultant, is doing a seminar called "Hidden Secrets of Illustrator CS." I plan on madly scribbling down the best of these for future DesignGeek issues, hope that's okay with you Mordy. (He's also a DesignGeek subscriber.) I love how the home page of Mordy's web site, http://www.mordy.com, cautions: "This site best viewed with a computer."
-- Me! That's right, Anne-Marie "HerGeekness" Concepcion will be doing the presentation on InDesign CS, "Moving to InDesign: Tips and Techniques from the Trenches." I'll cover the topic from the perspective of a designer and studio manager, and my co-presenter, James Wamser from Sells Printing in Milwaukee, WI will follow up with a commercial printer's perspective.
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Urgent News
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They're saying that space is limited, so be sure to register for the event asap. I know, I know, they always say that, but from what I saw at the recent Mac Design Conference (which was mobbed), also held in Chicago, graphic industry pros in the midwest jump on opportunities like this. Hope they're shipping in enough ribs and bratwurst for the lunch.
So you don't have to scroll, here's the agenda/registration link again:
http://adobe.regsvc.com/tk/?site=430g
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Update PDFs Without Losing Links
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The problem with interactive PDFs -- ones with bookmarks, hyperlinks, and/or form fields -- is that usually, the "interactive" part of them resides in Acrobat, not in the program you used to design the document.
You spend 80% of your time creating the file in an authoring program like QuarkXPress, InDesign, Word, etc.; then export it to PDF and spend 20% of your time in Acrobat adding links to other documents, tweaking bookmarks and creating buttons and form fields.
So if you find a tiny error in the finished PDF, you feel compelled to tweak what you can right in Acrobat. Change a letter here, nudge an image there, that kind of thing. That way you don't have to redo any links.
The problem is that at some point, you will need to open the original file to make a larger modification, and re-export it to PDF. Will you remember all those little fixes you did in Acrobat? Didn't think so.
Thus the preferred way to update a PDF is to always update the original file, even to fix a little typo, and re-export.
Is it possible to re-export a PDF and *not* lose any custom links, bookmarks and fields you made in Acrobat?
Why, yes it is. The key is to never write over the old PDF. Just replace its pages with new ones.
Here's how. When you need to update a PDF, open your original authoring file (which you should never toss out for this reason) and make your changes. Re-export it to PDF using the same compression/embedding settings you used for the first one, if you can remember, but with a different name for the PDF (e.g., "new pages.pdf").
Tiplet: When you're creating a document destined for PDF export, jot down somewhere in the file -- the pasteboard, or in a non-printing note or layer, someplace like that -- what settings you used for the PDF conversion. Or create a Preset with the document name, if the authoring program has that feature, like InDesign; or create a Distiller setting with the doc name. That way you can be sure your new PDF pages will match the old ones.
Now open the original PDF in Acrobat. If you updated every page of the file in your authoring program, stay at page 1. If you just fixed a typo on page 16, jump to page 16 in Acrobat.
To replace pages in the current, open PDF with pages from your "new pages.pdf" file, in Acrobat Pro v6, the command is found in Document->Pages->Replace. Earlier versions of Acrobat also have the Replace Pages command, though it might be in a different location in the menus.
You'll be prompted to select the file containing the replacement pages. Navigate to and double-click "new pages.pdf." Now you'll get a dialog asking which pages in 'new pages.pdf" should replace which pages in your current document. Tell it which pages, then click OK.
You'll find that your old PDF now contains the updated content, but all custom interactivity is still there. It's like bookmarks, links and fields live in a permanent top-most layer within Acrobat that is unaffected by anything happening "below" them in the messy world of text and images.
Select the Link, Button or a Field tool in Acrobat to make sure these elements are still aligned correctly with their underlying content, nudge or delete if necessary, and Save your document. You can toss out "new pages.pdf" at this point, but hang on to that originating file for the next time you need to update the file.
Another Tiplet: If you only need to update one or two pages of a large document, there's no need to re-export the whole thing to PDF. Just export the changed pages, and replace the old ones with these as described above.
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Text Frame Threading Tricks in InDesign
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Most InDesign users know that with a loaded text cursor (which you get when you Place a text file or after you click a text frame's red overset text icon with the Selection tool), and the right modifier keys, you can do some fancy autoflowing of text.
To review:
-- Shift-click will autoflow the complete file into multiple, threaded text frames, bounded by margin or column guides, adding pages to the document as necessary to place the entire story. The loaded text cursor changes to a solid, serpentine arrow when you hold down the Shift key.
-- Option/Alt-click is "semi-autoflow." The loaded text cursor changes to a dotted serpentine arrow to give you a clue that's it's not full autoflow. It creates one text frame bounded by the page's margin or column guides, but it also automatically reloads the cursor with any remaining text. This saves you the step of clicking on the frame's overset icon to reload the cursor yourself.
Did you know:
-- Holding down both the Shift *and* the Option/Alt key will give you a different sort of autoflow? It actually has no name, as far as I can tell, though it does have a special cursor: A downward-pointing arrow. (I nominate the name "demi-autoflow.") In this mode, InDesign will autoflow your text into multiple, threaded text frames, but it won't add any pages to your document, as regular autoflow (the Shift key) will. It stops at the last existing page, even if the final frame has overset text.
-- If you have a bunch of empty text frames set up, but they're not threaded, you can flow a story into them and thread them at the same time? Load your cursor with text and Option/Alt-click on each frame in turn.
-- Option/Alt-click also works as Option/Alt-drag? Starting with a loaded text cursor, hold down the Option or Alt key as you drag out custom text frames on the fly, and InDesign will thread the frames and load your cursor up with overset text as you go.
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TRAINING FROM SENECA GOES ON AND ON AND ON...
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This phenomenal level of support is just one of the benefits I offer to training clients. To learn more, contact me or fill out the no-obligation "Request a Training Quote' form on Seneca's site:
<http://www.senecadesign.com/training/request.html>
Recent training clients include BBDO Chicago (InDesign); S & C Electric (InDesign); Emergency Nurses Association (Quark 6, Photoshop CS and Illustrator CS); McDougal Littell (InDesign); the Chicago Cubs (Quark 6) and Phototype Engraving (Illustrator CS).
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DesignGeek is a free bimonthly publication written by Anne-Marie "HerGeekness" Concepcion, a cross-media designer and authorized Adobe and Quark training provider. She owns Seneca Design & Training, Inc. in Chicago, Illinois (http://www.senecadesign.com/).
To subscribe to DesignGeek or read archived issues, go to its home on Seneca's site: http://www.senecadesign.com/designgeek/subscribe.html
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Contact Seneca by phone at 312-946-1100 or e-mail at info@senecadesign.com
Copyright 2004 by Seneca Design & Training, Inc.
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