Duplicating a layer from one doc to another

Question

Is there an easy way to copy a layer, with unlinked text boxes on multiple pages, into another InDesign file, while retaining the position of the text boxes on each page?
I’ve got a multi-lingual document, with multiple layers (one for each language), in which I am duplicating the files and exporting as an INX file for text to be translated through Trados. Each INX file only has that language in it, and all other language text boxes and graphics are removed.
Once I receive these translated documents back, I need an easy method of bringing these languages back into the original file, replacing the un-translated text that was originally on that layer.
I was hoping to simply drag the translated layer into the original doc, or find an option under “duplicate layer” that would allow me to specify which document to duplicate it to, so that I could remove the original/un-translated layer and then this new/translated layer would just take it’s place.
Any advice would be much appreciated!

Answer 1

Well, if I wanted to be prickly and literal, I'd simply say "InDesign." I do think that it's one of the best applications available for circumstances such as you describe. What I'm advising against is using layers in ID to have a single file with, say, 4 languages in it. If you used that technique in Quark, or Illy, or even Publisher (does Publisher even have layers? I hope not), I'd still say "You should have a whole bunch of files, one for each language." You have a multilingual file with a number of different multilingual documents stored inside, and I think that this is a bad idea because I have never seen a TM/CAT app that plays well with a file with this kind of structure. If you're not using TM tools, it's not that bad, but your first post was all about "How am I going to roundtrip this doc through Trados" and, sadly, the answer is "You're going to break it out into a whole bunch of monolingual files, because that's what Trados expects."
There might be an argument for the layer-per-language method, but I genuinely can't make it. It always introduces more problems than it solves, EXCEPT in a case where a) there no TM tools are being used, and B) a "graphic designer," admin assistant, or generic flunky is involved that has bad file hygiene and is not skilled at keeping track of the languages and revision dates of many monolingual documents stored in many monolingual files. In that case, my advice is "Fire the flunky and hire one with good file hygiene." If the flunky is related by blood to the CTO, and is therefore unfireable, then I'd advise the DTP staff in question to use layers to store the various translations, so that the file-hygiene-impaired flunky only has one file to manage.
Now that I've gotten the I-wish-it-was-fictional rant out of the way:
1) If it's 32 pages long, I'd far rather use InDesign. Multi-page layouts in Illustrator are a pain. But you should work in whatever app suits your workflow and working methods. If you're expert in Illy but novice in ID, then I'm torn between saying "Use the app that you know!" and "What a great time for you to get to know ID!"
2) Frame vs. ID is a matter of taste here, I think. It depends on how you want to do the "varying layouts and lots of graphics." It's been a while since I used Frame, but I recall that I spent a lot of unhappy time wrestling graphics and text flows to look okay.
3) What if you already have this stuff in a multi-layer multilingual doc, and what you really need to do is to incorporate it into your TM? If you're required to hand off a single doc with one layer for each lang, then I'd seriously suggest looking into scripting the task. Or, if your workflow can handle refried PDFs, then make yourself a batch of monolingual InDesign docs, do your alignment or whatever it is you're doing in Trados, and then make PDFs of all of the final monolingual docs, and then place those into the language-specific layers. Basically, this is a cheat that says to the person taking receipt of the layered file who requires the localization staff to do more work than is necessary: "I cheated because you're making me do 2x the necessary amount of work for no good reason."
I'd love to hear an explanation as to why this one-lang-per-layer method is a good idea. Maybe there is something I'm missing...