Changes to layout in InDesign don't go over to InCopy

Question

Hi all,
recently we have been running into a strange phenomenon:
If the designer is just doing changes to the positioning of text frames (ie no edits that change the wrapping of text) updating the assignments does not work reliably.
I can replicate that on my machine (InDesign 5.03/InCopy 5.03; all files reside on a local file server in a folder I have full access to)
I created an InDesign file with several text frames that are exported as an assignment.
If I just move the frames and use "Update all assignments" or "Update assignment" nothing happens and the layout will not update in the opened InCopy assignment.
Afer several attempts (and some waiting in between) I can see the progress bar when updating the assignment - then the changes also show up in InCopy.
The problem is that our designers and editors are working from different locations - the editors will never notice the design changes if they don't show up in InCopy.
Can anyone shed some light on this - we're just starting work on another large cooperative project involving one designer and several editors using InCopy and I really don't want that to happen there...
Best regards
Mike
ps: Strange, I was in the impression this post would go to the InCopy Windows forum - we are working on windows. Sorry for that.
ps2: It seems that the "Update all Assignments" button does not work at all in this case. Selecting the assignment and using "Update Assignment" works better, but not always.

Answer 1

Mike, "Update All Assignments" will only update assignments that are out of date... ones that show the out of date yellow triangle in the ID users's Assignments panel. I know it's not very clear... the command should read "Update All Out of Date Assignments."
Before I get into details about why Adobe doesn't consider an assignment to be out of date when you've clearly changed it, you should know that the command Update Selected Assignment (select it first of course) will force an update even if ID doesn't think it's necessary. So use that command, and have your editors keep an eye on the out of date icon/title bar message in IC so they can choose Update Design.
There are many changes you can make in ID, even to checked-out text frames in an assignment, that don't cause ID to make that assignment go out of date. Moving them around, for example, doesn't make the assignment go out of date because (the thinking goes) the IC user still has the same amount of room in the text frame. Ditto for adding/adjusting non-workflow items to the master page that controls an assignment's spread.
And anything you do to a frame that's not part of the assignment, such as deleting it, adding new ones, changing its size ...again none of these actions directly affect the text of the frames that *are* part of the assignment (assuming text wrap is not involved) so according to ID, the assignment doesn't need updating. So choosing Update All will not do a thing.
BUT if an IC user opens an assignment *after* you've made and saved those changes to the ID file, they'll see the latest version .. with the moved-around text frame, with the new background color from the master page, etc.
I think Adobe is trying to keep a lid on how often the designer needs to push an update to an assignment, reduce the network traffic. That's why the out-of-date icon on an assignment only shows when you've resized/changed columns etc. of a workflow story, or added a new story (exported it to IC and included it in the assignment), or removed a workflow story.
AM