Friends who have used Indesign know that this software is very convenient to arrange books and periodicals, and many of its functions are not available in other software. The function of this software is very powerful, but because of some functions people are not used to, so it feels uncomfortable to use. Taking its directory generation function as an example, a friend who first contacts may find this function cumbersome and difficult to use. In fact, if you can fully understand the meaning of each setting and practice it, you will find that its directory generation function is very convenient, and the generated directory is also very standard. This article expands on this in detail. 1. Clear catalog items (define title style) Before generating a catalog, first of all, what content will appear in the catalog? Such as chapter headings, section headings or subsection headings, etc. Taking a book with three-level headings as an example, we may call these titles first-level headings (equivalent to chapter headings), second-level headings (equivalent to section headings), and third-level headings (equivalent to section headings). To make these titles appear automatically in the table of contents, first of course, we must unify their format, that is, we must first define these titles as styles. To this end, we define three paragraph styles of first-level heading, second-level heading and third-level heading in paragraph style. In order to let the reader fully understand: we first explain the style. In Indesign, style is a collection of format attributes. That is, all these format attributes are defined first, and can be applied to the corresponding objects in one step in the future. The method of defining paragraph styles is as follows: click the New button in the paragraph style panel, and then modify the relevant parameters of the paragraph (such as font, font size, paragraph front and back spacing, etc.) in the dialog box that comes out, and finally determine. Then apply these paragraph styles to the corresponding headings in the body. 2. Define the entry style After the paragraph styles of the titles are defined, the next thing to do is to define what appearance (namely format) these titles will appear in the table of contents in the future, that is, their fonts and font sizes in the table of contents. In the Indesign directory function dialog box, this setting is called the entry style. So we might as well call them first-level, second-level, and third-level items, respectively, in the same way as above. That is, the format of the three titles in the catalog in the future will be the format of first-level entry, second-level entry, and third-level entry. (Note: These three entry styles are also defined in the paragraph style panel). Special note: The title style determines which items are eligible to appear in the catalog, and the entry style determines what appearance (format) these items appear in the catalog. At this time, pay special attention to, when defining the style of the entry, in addition to setting the basic parameters of the font size, also set the leading character between the entry and the page number and the position of the entry. We can set it with tabs in the Paragraph Style dialog box. We can set the position of the item by pulling the symbol on the ruler, and enter the ellipsis in the leading option box. (Explanation: the input method of ellipsis, right-click the input method activity panel, open the punctuation soft keyboard, and select the ellipsis.) 3. Define the catalog title style The next step is to define the paragraph style of the "table of contents". Of course, its format can also be modified after it is generated, but in order to automatically generate it uniformly, it is still defined in the paragraph style. We can define the "table of contents" style. 4. Define the page number style Another paragraph style needs to be defined in advance, which is the style of the page number. We define it as "page number style", and the page number style determines what appearance (format) the page number appears in the catalog. In addition, we have to insert a corresponding blank page in front of the body to prepare the directory to be generated, and we all know that the directory page usually does not occupy the page number, in view of this, we must use the first page of the body as the starting page, method Select the first page of the text in the "Page" palette, then right-click to open the "Page Number and Chapter Options" dialog box, and select "Start Page Number". The above is the preparation work to be done before generating the catalog. 5. Generate directory Select "Layout / Directory" to open the directory generation dialog. Option 1: It is a directory style. Here is a name for the directory style you will generate next. As shown in the picture, we named it "Directory Style 1". The title option box below is of course the word "table of contents", and the style is the paragraph style of the "table of contents title" we just defined. Option 2: The styles in the table of contents, here is to add the headings that use the relevant paragraph styles. We add all the paragraph styles of the previously defined first-level heading, second-level heading, and third-level heading. Note that every time you add one, you must set the entry style of the title, that is, the title style and the entry style must correspond to each other. Option 3: Page number setting. There are two option boxes. The first option box prompts you to select the arrangement position of the page number. There are three options of "After Entry", "Current Article" and "No Page Number". The general list is to select "After Entry", the second This option box is the page number style. This style is already defined in the paragraph style in advance, that is, "page number style". In the option box between the next entry and the page code, select "Tab" as shown in Figure 2, and select "None" for the style. The rest of the remaining options use the default, and the setting of the entire directory is completed. If you want to save the style of this directory, click "Save Style". If you don't want to save, click "OK" directly. Six shown. If the generated directory is wrong, you can correct the related errors and then use the command "Layout / Update Directory" to update the directory. 6. Summary The key point of the directory generation function in Indesign is to understand the meaning of the style and be able to use the style proficiently. Before generating the table of contents, there are four styles to be defined: the title style, the entry style, the directory title style, and the page number style. The title style determines which items are eligible to appear in the catalog, and the entry style determines what appearance (format) these items appear in the catalog. The catalog title style determines the format of the title "catalog", while the page number style determines In what format does the page number appear in the table of contents. Commercial Furniture,Commercial Office Furniture,Commercial Desk,Commercial Lounge Furniture NINGBO CHEN WEI SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT CO.,LTD , https://www.chenweisupply.com