Applying paragraph styles to placed text

I have a catalog document built with with master pages and paragraph styles. The layout has a grid of image boxes for product with a text box beneath for descriptions. The text boxes should have style 1 applied to the 1st line, and style 2 applied to the following lines. Style 1 is applied to the text boxes in the master, and has next style set to style 2 in the paragraph style settings. This works fine when typing directly in the document, but I am placing the text from a word document. When I place the text, InDesign is just applying the default text settings instead of the correct styles. Is there a way to get it to automatially apply the correct styles, or will I need to manually set the styles?
Using CS5
thanks,
Katie

Part of your answer is very easy: after you've placed your text, select a few paragraphs, and then right-click on "style 1" and select "Apply Style, Then Next Style." That's how to use "Next Style" on text that you've placed.
The other part of your question -
When I place the text, InDesign is just applying the default text settings instead of the correct styles. Is there a way to get it to automatially apply the correct styles, or will I need to manually set the styles?
is a fair bit more complicated. If you're placing Word files, and all of the text in Word is styled with "Normal," then you'd probably need to manually set styles. If the text is in Word, but is styled carefully, then you can click the "Import Options" checkbox upon placing, and you can do all kinds of things to the file, including stripping all Word formatting & mapping Word styles to InDesign styles. If you have text in some other format, it may be possible to automate styling, but it depends completely on what you have to place. Raw text with XML tags? CSV files? RTFs generated by a translation memory tool? If you can post example files or screenshots, we may be able to figure out a way to smooth out this part of your workflow, depending on the materials with which you're working.

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Find.text Then apply Paragraph.Style

Hi Everyone,
Is that possible we find the text then apply the paragraph style every find text.
We find [CN] then apply paragraph style "Chap_Num", Find next [CT] apply PS "Chap_TTL" Find next [COX1] apply PS "Chap_Para".
Any trick find and apply para style one time.
Thank you! I appreciate your help and explanation Adv.

@s_ashok – you'll find the right methods and properties in the CHM file for InDesign CS2 at:
http://www.jongware.com/idjshelp.html
Just a few hints:
InDesign CS2 does not support GREP search/replace, so every line in your code that points to GREP does not work.
Further: "app.findTextPreferences" and "app.changeTextPreferences" were "app.findPreferences" and "app.changePreferences" in InDesign CS2. And then there were no "findChangeTextOptions" or any counterpart for that in CS2…
That should get you running…
I have no InDesign CS2 installed to debug, so this is all I can say…
Uwe

How to know if a applied paragraph style has changed

in Applescript, is there a propertie to know if a applied paragraph style in not "the original"
==> title become title+
Thanks

One way to do it in Applescript:
tell application "Adobe InDesign CS6"
          tell document 1
                    tell page 1
                              tell (every text frame whose label is "frame1")
-- paragraph 1 has no style overrides
                                        return style overridden of paragraph 1 --> false
-- paragraph 2's leading is different
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                    end tell
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end tell

[JS or AS] Applying Paragraph Styles.

Hi,
I have a JavaScript From Dave Saunders. Which Takes a list of all Para and Character styles from an InDesign File and make a .txt file.
Which works great.
So because I don't understand JavaScript and Very Basic Applescript.
I have made a basic AppleScript which Creates a Document and place the .txt file which the JavaScript created.
I know how to apply a Paragraph Style in AppleScript using the
set applied paragraph style of paragraph 1 to ParaName
My problem is I don't know how I can match and apply Paragraphs Styles and Character styles from the list generated from the .txt file to the corresponding Paragraph and Character styles in InDesign?
Obviously if it could be all done Via JavaScript then yeah, otherwise AppeScript all do as well.
Any help or ideas would be great.

Thanks Shane
Oh I didn't think I had to set myStory to anything as it's the only story, so I thought it's would automacticly make it the parent story...learn something new...
I also forgot to import the Paragraph Style into the new document which I've fixed,
but It falls over at the set applied paragraph line.
tell application "Adobe InDesign CS3"
     --Pick file to import styles from
     set myFilePath to (choose file)
     --Create a new document.
     set mydoc to make document
     tell mydoc
          import styles format text styles format from myFilePath
     end tell
     tell page 1 of document 1
          set newFrame to make new text frame with properties {geometric bounds:{1, 1, 275, 210}}
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          place (choose file) on newFrame
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          repeat with i from 1 to count of paragraphs of myStory
               set thisStyleName to contents of paragraph i of myStory
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               end if
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end tell

[CS4 JS] Find a paragraph style and get text contents

Hello,
I would like to get to contents of text that is applied with a specific paragraph style, so that I can copy it to another text frame
app.findTextPreferences = app.changeTextPreferences = null;
app.findTextPreferences.appliedParagraphStyle = "headline";
// and then get the value/contents of that applied paragraph style
Sjoerd

Something like this:
str = "";
found = app.activeDocument.findText();
for (i = 0; i < found.length; i++)
str += found[i].contents;
"str" now contains aal text styled with that paragraph, which you can now save in a text file.
Peter

Different paragraph styles within a text thread

Does anybody know if it's possible to apply a different paragraph style to each text box in a text thread? I have three boxes: the first and the last have a small font and I'd like the middle one to have a larger font size.
If it's not possible, is there an alternative way to do this?
Thanks,
Nacho

Offhand i'd say that what Nacho wants to do will entail having separate text boxes...
Seems to me that what he's doing is having the text flow from one box to another (column?). Obviously, changing / editing content will cause the text to shift its position.
Nacho, i think you'll have to do one of the following:
1/ Manually adjust the font style for the box you want each time you mke a correction
or
2/ Set up different, independent boxes (text areas) and style the box the way you want. Obviously changing text will mean changes in the area used by that box...
Maybe someone else here can help out with a better suggestion...

How to apply paragraph styles to xml tag?

Hi All,
How to apply paragraph style to xml tag?

Hi Learner,
Try the below js code.
var myDoc = app.activeDocument;
try{
    mySel=app.selection[0];
    myDoc.xmlElements[0].xmlElements.add({markupTag:"TEST", xmlContent:mySel});
    }catch(e){
        alert(e);
var myDocument = app.activeDocument;
app.findGrepPreferences.appliedParagraphStyle = "test";
app.findGrepPreferences.findWhat = ".+(?=\\r)"
var mySearch = myDocument.findGrep(false);
for (a=0; a<mySearch.length; a++){
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thx,
csm_phil

Auto apply paragraph style

Hi all,
I m new to indesign scripting. I need a help to correct my script.
Its a basic scritpt to created to apply paragraph style 1 to the basic paragraph . after doing this, i want to apply the paragraph style 2 created to the next paragraphs likewise and so on.
var myDoc = app.activeDocument;
app.findGrepPreferences = NothingEnum.NOTHING;
app.findGrepPreferences.appliedParagraphStyle = myDoc.paragraphStyles.itemByName("[Basic Paragraph]");
var myResult = app.findGrep();
app.changeGrepPreferences.appliedParagraphStyle = myDoc.paragraphStyles.itemByName("Paragraph Style 1");
var myResult1 = app.changeGrep();
    app.findGrepPreferences = NothingEnum.NOTHING; //to clear the selected paragraph panel
    app.changeGrepPreferences = NothingEnum.NOTHING; //to clear the changed paragraph panel
Can anybody help on this, please.
thanks
babylon.

what error does it give??
try this
var doc=app.activeDocument;
function resetOpt(){ // saves the find change options and resets the to default
    var old_fCGOpts=app.findChangeGrepOptions.properties;
    var old_fGPref=app.findGrepPreferences.properties;
    var old_cGPref=app.changeGrepPreferences.properties;
    app.findChangeGrepOptions=NothingEnum.NOTHING;
    app.findGrepPreferences=NothingEnum.NOTHING;
    app.changeGrepPreferences=NothingEnum.NOTHING;
    return [old_fCGOpts,old_fGPref,old_cGPref]
function restoreOpt(myOpt){
    app.findChangeGrepOptions.properties=myOpt[0];
    app.findGrepPreferences.properties=myOpt[1];
    app.changeGrepPreferences.properties=myOpt[2];
var myOpt=resetOpt(); //save and reset Find/Change Options
app.findGrepPreferences.appliedParagraphStyle = doc.paragraphStyles.itemByName("[Basic Paragraph]");
app.changeGrepPreferences.appliedParagraphStyle = doc.paragraphStyles.itemByName("Paragraph Style 1");
var myResult1 = doc.changeGrep();
restoreOpt(myOpt); //restore previous find change options

Problem with footer in table style not applying paragraph style... or just me?

I'm having a niggling problem making a table style with cell/paragraph styles for the header, body, and footer respectively. I want to make it as simple as possible for other users but one thing keeps tripping me up. I'll try and describe with screenshots. I'm using InDesign CS5 on Windows 7.
I have a table style set up with cell styles for the header, body, and footer, and paragraph styles for each as well. Say I'm converting a list of generic text to this table:
i convert it to my table style. The body style is a numbered list:
I convert the header to an, err, Header. The cell applies the header paragraph style as I should expect:
I convert the footer likewise, but it maintains the Body text paragraph style as an override!
So naturally I clear the override and it works fine. But of course, I'd rather it acted like the header row. I can't work out where the override on the footer comes from and why it operates differently in this respect to the header row. There is nothing different about how the styles are constructed. Have I made a mistake somewhere, or is this correct behaviour I'm misinterpreting, or something...?
edit: Here is the file, if that will help:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/4kzgui1itaskuvz/strip%20list%20test.indd

Hi,
I was able to reproduce the issue you are facing.
I will be logging a bug for this and it would be investigated.
Thanks a lot for reporting the problem!!
Javed

InDesign erroneously applies character style to imported text

For a year, I had been importing text into InDesign with little trouble until this problem starting happening and I can't figure out why.
Let's say I have a CS3 file with defined character and paragraph styles.
If I draw an empty text box, InDesign shows the character style "superscript" and paragraph style "ext_all" are applied. I can select "Break Link to Style," but if I import text into that box, the "superscript" character style is applied.
The following happens whether I create a text box first or not:
If I import a styled Word file, all the text comes in styled "superscript" until it reaches a Word character style.
If I import an InDesign Tagged Text file, all the text comes in styled "superscript" until it reaches a character tag.
If I import a very simple one sentence rtf file, all the text is styled "superscript."
Anyone run into this? I've tried googling, but can't find a discussion about it. Thanks in advance!

Perhaps you've inadvertently set those styles as the defaults? That would happen if you click on them with nothing selected. For the current document switch to the text tool and make sure there is no cursor active or text frame selected, then check to see that the character style is set to [None] and the paragraph style to what you would like to be your default. Also check the settings in the character and paragraph panels.
To make sure this doesn't carry forward into any more new documents, if indeed that was the problem, close all documents and repeat the above steps. With no documents open your selections will become the defaults for all new work until changed.
Peter

How to handle paragraph styles in imported text with no tagged paragraph styles

Hi
Im currently trying to import a file (word file / excel I have both formats) into an indesign book and formatting the text automatically!
My question is: How is it possible to reflow text into frames and when changing frame it changes paragraph?
Or how is it possible to change paragraph style when forcing a line break when using text reflow?
I have already figured out how to reflow the text, and actually also managed to relow text into the frames and change paragraph style. I know how to use the keep option, and by this change the paragraph style when e.g. changing frame break/page break etc. (but if the content being flowed-in is not tagged with style names then I cannot figure out how to do it) The document and its content I whish to import do not have any tagged paragraphs!
Then I tried to look into "object styles" and format a text frame on a master page with an object style, and by using a "dilimiter character" forcing the text to start in a new frame when bringing the frame into live on a page. But here I cannot make the "text frame/object style" to apply or to work.
If any of you have a hint, I would be more than happy to hear from you
This picture are illustrating the outcome I would to get to....

If the incoming text does not have styles, or has only one style, there is really not much you can do other than assign styles after the import. If there are recognizable patterns in the formatting, a lot of that can be done with Find/Change, and there are a few scripts floating around that can help automate some of that.
Also, if your styles have a a good "next style" heirarchy built in, you can select large blocks of text (up to the point where applying next style would be incorrect), then right click the style name in the paragraph styles panel and choose apply style and next style (remove overrides). Warning. Removing overrides will remove any locally applied formatting like bold or italics, so local formatting should be converted to character styles first. Applied character styles are not overrides and will be preserved.

FIND/CHANGE - Applying Paragraph Style

Hello,
I used FIND/CHANGE to apply my paragraph style and when I apply the paragraph style... it applies the style to the entire line.
For example,
A. #70712 resulted to A. #70712
I only wanted the "#70712" to be changed to my style. I used the GREP search and entered #.+ and then I choose the paragraph style I want and clicked change all. The problem is that it changed all the text on that line and applied the paragraph style.
Please help. Thank you very much.

graphicsoc wrote:
Hello,
I used FIND/CHANGE to apply my paragraph style and when I apply the paragraph style... it applies the style to the entire line.
For example,
A. #70712 resulted to A. #70712
I only wanted the "#70712" to be changed to my style. I used the GREP search and entered #.+ and then I choose the paragraph style I want and clicked change all. The problem is that it changed all the text on that line and applied the paragraph style.
Please help. Thank you very much.
If I understand your request correctly:
If your paragraph style uses a numbered list to create the "A." and the remainder of the paragraph consists of only "# 70712" that you type in manually (or place from an existing file), I believe that you you don't need GREP. You can format the auto-numbered list differently from the remainder of its paragraph, by specifying a character style for the number portion.
To extract only the non-numbered portion of an auto-numbered paragraph, for a TOC, in the Table of Contents dialog box, open the bottom part by clicking More Options if necessary, and in the Numbered Paragraphs pull-down menu, select Exclude Numbers.
Read more about Table of Contents in Help, and/or with a Google search for terms like "InDesign table of contents numbered list exclude numbers" without quotes.
If you need additional special formatting "tricks" in the source paragraphs, or in the TOC entry paragraphs, look into Nested Styles and GREP
Styles in Help or Google searches.
HTH
Regards,
Peter
Peter Gold
KnowHow ProServices

Applying paragraph style makes it BOLD

I have lots of nice paragraph styles, and NONE of them specify bold in their definitions. Yet, every time I apply one of these styles, the paragraph is bold. I don't know what's going on. Do you?

I've looked at your file, and basically it's what SRiegle has said, but I'm going to go into more detail to try to help you understand what's happening.
If you look at the Character Style panel with no text selected you'll see the Bold style highlighted. This means it is set to the default and all new text you enter will have the Bold style. You want to change this to [None].
Because the text all has Bold applied, at some point the font weight was changed manually on the paragraphs to Regular. This becomes an override of the character style and if you click in the text you'll see the character style change to Bold+. The paragraph style shows no plus sign because character styles are not considered overrides.
Now the tricky part. When you change the paragraph style, the local override on the character style is removed, but not the Bold style itself, so the new paragraph style is applied along with the Bold character style.
Is that making any sense?

Problem applying Paragraph styles in CS4 InDesign

I boughtCS4 InDesign for Windows perhaps six months ago, and it worked fine with Windows XP. I have recently installed Windows 7 and find that the paragraph styles won't always work. Of ten when I try to use the shortcut for paragraph style the paragraph in question turns pink with small squares in it. If I undo the application of paragraph styles it goes back to text. I am using Times New Roman as the major font. However, I have tried other fonts and they won't work in paragraph style either.
I tried changing several pages of the manuscript to Times New Roman Special G1, but it won't do the commas, quotes, etc. (special characters).
Has anyone else had this problem? What can I do to fix this mess?
Thanks for any help.
Earl Davis

Well, here's the situation now. But before describing it, let me thank Peter
Spier and Bob Levine who have endeavored to help me. Now, here's where we
are:
I copied a document over from Pagemaker into InDesign using Times New Roman
font. (I did the same for two other book manuscripts this past summer,
shortly after purchasing InDesign and had no problem). Suddenly a couple
weeks ago I found that the shortcut I set for the paragraph styles did not
format the paragraphs, etc., but rather turned the paragraph in which I
placed the cursor into a series of pink squares highlighted in pink. I have
tried the suggestions you fellows have given, such as copying the fonts
presently in the Windows Font Directory into the Adobe/InDesign/Fonts
directory, and then right-clicking on them and installing them. By the way,
the InDesign font directory only had the Times New Roman and Times New Roman
Special 1 and Renaissance font in it, until I copied all my fonts there and
installed them. Another oddity, I make the first letter of the first
paragraph of each chapter a decorative Renaissance font, spanning two lines.
I now find that when I do that, I may get a black square, which may turn
into the correct font after I adjust the size to two lines.
But on the general problem, I have tried changing the font in the
paragraph styles to Amerigo BT, and I sometimes get the shortcut to work,
and sometimes it still turns it into Times New Roman Special or black
squares. Also, I have opened a new file and put another copy of the text in
it, setting up the paragraph styles, etc. and still have the same problem.
So I'm at a loss what to do. I do think it's possible I am doing
something wrong with fonts or setting up the paragraph styles, but I don't
see any errors there. All my computer fonts show up in the fonts panel of
the document. Any more ideas?

Applying paragraph style to a single paragraph affects all previous paragraphs

Hey,
I'm trying to create a script that would take an array of text objects that describe what the text and style of a particular line of text is. And in some lines to apply Character Styles as well.
The problem is that, while the script works when the loop is in the character styles "mode", it seems to apply the paragraph styles to all the previous lines of text when the aforementioned object asks it to apply only the paragraph style (no character styles).
The offending line is this:
if ( typeof line.text == 'string' ) {
    frame.contents += "\r" + line.text;
    frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].appliedCharacterStyle = doc.characterStyles[0];
    frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].applyParagraphStyle(style);
    continue;
I even copied the style-apllying lines from the Character-Styles-applying section of the script (the else part), but it still applies the style to all the previous lines of text. The script below is the full code I have I long with one of the objects that text data. If I comment out the "offending lines" mentioned above, the script applyes all the styles correctly. Otherwise, only the last line (the Product - Description style) is applied, while all the previous lines attain the 'Spacer' style.
Can anyone see what I'm doing wrong? (sorry for the giant piece of code, but I can't pin-point what's not relevant here).
    'text': [
            'style': 'Product - Title No Indent',
            'text': [
                'Test Product',
                    'style': 'Superscript',
                    'text': '®'
                ' Title'
        { 'style': 'Spacer', 'text': ' x' },
        { 'style': 'Spacer', 'text': ' x' },
        { 'style': 'Spacer', 'text': ' x' },
            'style': 'Product - Description',
            'text': ['Designed for monitoring steam sterilization processes.']
function add_text_to_frame (frame, product) {
    var i, l, j, k, line, style, line_styles, char_style, line_text, bit;
    for ( i = 0, l = product.text.length; i < l; i++ ) {
        line = product.text[i];
        style = doc.paragraphStyles.item( line.style );
        if ( typeof line.text == 'string' ) {
            frame.contents += "\r" + line.text;
            frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].appliedCharacterStyle = doc.characterStyles[0];
            frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].applyParagraphStyle(style);
            continue;
        else {
            line_styles = new Array();
            line_text = '';
            for ( j = 0, k = line.text.length; j < k; j++ ) {
                bit = line.text[j];
                if ( typeof bit == 'string' ) {
                    line_text += bit;
                else {
                    line_styles.push({
                        'start': line_text.length,
                        'end': line_text.length + bit.text.length,
                        'style': bit.style
                    line_text += bit.text;
            frame.contents += "\r" + line_text;
            frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].appliedCharacterStyle = doc.characterStyles[0];
            frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].applyParagraphStyle(style);
            for ( j = 0, k = line_styles.length; j < k; j++ ) {
                char_style = doc.characterStyles.item(line_styles[j].style);
                frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].characters.itemByRange(
                    line_styles[j].start,
                    line_styles[j].end
                ).applyCharacterStyle(char_style, true);

Here's the shortest code with the problem I could come up with.... You can run it if you create two different default paragraph styles: 'Product - Description' and 'Product - Title No Indent';
The problem is that the first line should have 'Product - Description' style, but it instead it gets 'Product - Title No Indent'.
If I comment out one of the paragraphs, everything works fine. What's wrong?
var doc = app.documents.add(),
    product, text_frame, i, l;
product = {
    'text': [
            'style': 'Product - Description',
            'text': 'Designed for monitoring sterilization processes.'
            'style': 'Product - Title No Indent',
            'text': 'Designed for monitoring sterilization processes.'
            'style': 'Product - Description',
            'text': 'Designed for monitoring sterilization processes.'
text_frame = doc.pages[0].textFrames.add();
text_frame.geometricBounds = [ '0pt', '0pt', '240pt', '300pt'];
for ( i = 0, l = product.text.length; i < l; i++ ) {
    text_frame.contents += "\r" + product.text[i].text;
    text_frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].appliedCharacterStyle = doc.characterStyles[0];
    text_frame.parentStory.paragraphs[-1].applyParagraphStyle(
        doc.paragraphStyles.item( product.text[i].style )

Applying paragraph styles to placed text

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