7 Replies Latest reply: Feb 19, 2009 6:57 AM by Fred Goldman RSS

    Alphabetization of names in index...

    RodneyA Community Member
      I have to say, I've never seen this kind of alphabetization before. I have an index of names. Note how the various entries for the last name "Ma" are completely separated from each other:

      Ma, H. S. 366, 369
      Mai, M. 319
      Mai, P.M. 322, 329, 333
      Ma, K.F. 333, 334
      Mak, S. 322
      Malagnini, L. 327, 334, 352, 376
      Malakan, A. 326
      Manighetti, I. 333
      Marano, K. 300, 303
      Marco, S. 350
      Marcucci, A. 347
      Martini, M. 340, 341
      Marzocchi, W. 370
      Ma, S. 311, 320

      I can see WHY it's doing this -- it ignores commas and spaces -- but I don't think that's correct. By this logic, Pie, Apple would be separated from Pie, Pecan by Piedmont. I assume there's nothing that can be done about this, other than going into each Index tag and say "alphabetize this as though it's Ma1. Ma2. Ma3," etc.?
        • 1. Re: Alphabetization of names in index...
          Michael Gianino Community Member
          Sort
          b Ma, H. S.
          as
          b Maa, H. S.
          and
          b Ma, K.F.
          as
          b Maa, K.F.

          They will still display in the generated index as Ma, but will sort correctly.
          • 2. Re: Alphabetization of names in index...
            RodneyA Community Member
            Right -- it's just that I've got about a thousand index entries, so I'll have to go through and find the ones where I don't like the sort order and fix them. Not my cup of tea :-) but what can one do.
            • 3. Re: Alphabetization of names in index...
              Community Member
              I have the same problem. I get:

              Carlson, Philip R., MD 314
              Carr, Carol H., CNM, MS 198
              Carrel, Aaron L., MD 256, 262
              Carrithers, Michael D., MD, PhD 171
              Carr, Kathleen E., MD 96, 282, 342
              Casey, Kristin T., CPNP 267

              where I would expect

              Carlson, Philip R., MD 314
              Carr, Carol H., CNM, MS 198
              Carr, Kathleen E., MD 96, 282, 342
              Carrel, Aaron L., MD 256, 262
              Carrithers, Michael D., MD, PhD 171
              Casey, Kristin T., CPNP 267

              Yes, I can go in and adjust this manually, but why should I have to when the exact same method on the exact same project worked perfectly (*PERFECTLY*) using InDesign CS2?
              • 4. Re: Alphabetization of names in index...
                RodneyA Community Member
                In my opinion, Adobe screwed this one up. There are times when you might want this alphabetization, but I can't think of one off-hand. Fortunately, you can at least correct all of the Carr, Kathleen entries with one change rather than 3. If you change both Carr, Carol and Carr, Kathleen entries to sort as Carraa, Carol and Carraa, Kathleen, they'll behave.

                I notice that the Index function has a variety of sort options for different languages. Might there be a different language setting that indexes properly? What we want is an alphabetization scheme where spaces and punctuation count as a letter before "A." Is it possible to create new sort behaviors?

                Where is that "bug alert" or "feature request" link again?
                • 5. Re: Alphabetization of names in index...
                  Michael Gianino Community Member
                  I get the same results in CS3, and since you say it worked in CS2, I wonder if CS4 still has the bug, or if they fixed it. BTW, Quark 8 does it correctly.
                  • 6. Re: Alphabetization of names in index...
                    RodneyA Community Member
                    CS4 is where I first noticed it, but it may have just been bad proofreading in CS3 (I only do indexes about once a year...)
                    • 7. Re: Alphabetization of names in index...
                      Fred Goldman Community Member
                      Yes, it was around in CS3. It a horrible bug/feature whatever you want
                      to call it. I have filed a bug report (and I know others have, too) but
                      is has fallen on deaf ears.