The ultimate cure for a stubborn table of contents that will not update or generate is this:
Open your document and delete the table of contents you already have and
save the document, then use the "select all" command to copy to your
clipboard, then close that file.
Open a new document and paste the clipboard data into the new document (you may need to paste it into a text box), save the file with a new name and then build the table of contents.
What you did was fix a corrupted file that was causing TOC failures. There
is no other cure for such corruption, but this advice works so you can
get back to work.
I know, as my TOC on a book would not build and nobody's advice cured the problem. Just do what I did and you will have a fresh clean document once again.
Question: Why are there problems with the Table of Contents?
Answer:
It must be a bug in the software or something we do that causes a
faulty command to be generated inside the TOC itself. It is maddening
to try to build a new TOC when it is corrupted. You just need to find a
method to copy your entire book document without copying any TOC
elements in the TOC page. It is those TOC pages that cause the trouble.
Question: Can't I just drag and highlight the entire TOC pages and hit the delete button?
Answer:
You can try it, but it never has worked for me. For some reason that
procedure still leaves a deeply buried corrupted code in the document so
when you try to build a TOC again it will fail. The method I use
works, but it took me dozens of hours to figure it out by trial and
error and nobody from Adobe could help me solve the problem. Even a
In-Design college failed to help me. I was afraid I was going to have
to build a TOC by hand as the corruption was relentless, but thank God
for His blessings.
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PS: What if That Does Not Work? Do this:
Delete
the TOC in the original document and save the file. Close the file,
then reopen it. This way any corruption commands in the TOC itself will
be removed (or most of it). Now, instead of "select all" place your
mouse cursor in the first paragraph line below the Table of Contents.
Put the cursor just one letter in (example in this paragraph put cursor
between D and e. Now hold the right mouse button and scroll down all
the pages to select them (I know, it is a tedious task) until you get to
the end of the document. It should all be highlighted, now select all
to copy it into the clipboard. Close the file, open a new file and
paste the clipboard info into the new document (or into a text box if
need be).
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Message was edited by: Peter Spier
