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Hi folks!
Is is possible in InDesign to have a stroke on only one side of a square? And if so, how do i go about doing that?
On Mac OSX 10.6.4, InDesign CS5
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is there any reason why you couldnt just add a vertical or horizontal line?
Andy Barrington
www.professionalaffordabledesign.com
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Yes, related to the last question i posted, i am trying to hide a column in a table which i can't delete as i will need it later, and i don't want to have 2 documents. So i want the left hand stroke of the square I'm using to hide the column to look like the right hand stroke of the table. Sounds mad but it's about the best, easiest and quickest solution I've had so far lol!
I suppose i could just use a separate stroke and square but i want to keep this as simple as possible so if there is a way to have one side of the square a stroke, that would be fab. I fear there is not an easy way to do this.....
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Why don't you just fill the box rather than stroking the square?
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linziloop wrote:
Yes, related to the last question i posted, i am trying to hide a column in a table which i can't delete as i will need it later, and i don't want to have 2 documents. So i want the left hand stroke of the square I'm using to hide the column to look like the right hand stroke of the table. Sounds mad but it's about the best, easiest and quickest solution I've had so far lol!
I suppose i could just use a separate stroke and square but i want to keep this as simple as possible so if there is a way to have one side of the square a stroke, that would be fab. I fear there is not an easy way to do this.....
Have you tried to create a table cell style with a stroke on the side you want it, and a paragraph style whose character color is Paper, then select the column and apply the cell style to it? It will take a bit of fussing until you get it right.
HTH
Regards,
Peter
_______________________
Peter Gold
KnowHow ProServices
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The only way to have a stroke on one side of a squrae that I know of, other than drawing a separate rule (presuming you mean you want a stroke on a vertical edge -- for horizontal you could use a paragraph rule), is to use a one-cell table.
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That would be a very useful feature. You can do it in tables but not in boxes. I'm going to submit a feature request for it -- you can do the same and maybe we'll get it eventually!
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.. But InDesign isn't limited to just "boxes". What with triangles, or 5-pointed stars?
Even Illustrator -- fully targeted to illustrating, other than InDesign -- doesn't have this "feature". Possibly because there is no logic behind it.
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@ Jongware - Sorry, should have said "frame" not "box." I would think the feature should work on any kind of polygon. And there is no reason not to ask for that feature. It's logical to me; I work at a company whose branding requires a thick green stroke at the bottom of all pictures, and a thin grey stroke on the other 3 sides.
Or by "logic" maybe you meant a technical developer term...
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There is plenty of logic behind it. What if I wanted to make a shape that has a stroke on one side? That's the "logic!" I didn't realize art had to fit rules of logic.
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I just has a flash and figured out a way to do it on one edge (doesn't work if you want to to turn a corner or do opposite edges to have more than one stroke). You can use the type on a path feature to put a tab character on the path of the frame (I use a right indent tab and adjust the start and stop marker positons along the path), then apply an underline to the tab.
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@ Peter - interesting solution! That did work. Not as easy as a stroke setting but much easier than having separate boxes on top of the frame!
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Make a style to add the underline.
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You could use the scissors tool to cut the image frame at the lower two corners. You do end up with multiple objects, but you can group them readily enough.
Save the group as a snippet for easy import into documents.
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I used this technique for quite a few projects, but with actually pasting a line into the text box. This is more elegant and flexible. Thank you.
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You could draw a 0.5pt line, then <cut> it and <paste> it in using the text insertion cursor at the top of your text frame. Select the line, and nudge it up by about 9pt.
Alternatively, you could use a Right-indent tab <shift+tab> at the top of your text frame, and give that line a paragraph rule above. If you offset the rule by about 3mm, it lines up okay.
Either way, it's a kludge. It would be nice if frames supported different strokes on each side. When going to HTML/CSS feels 'easy and liberating', something's screwy 😕
For non-quadrilateral polygons, Adobe could just do what they do everywhere else, and grey-out the options where a feature isn't supported. Given the number of times I use triangles and stars, this would inconvenience me approximately never.
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This was bugging me too, and I tried this solution:
What I'm essentailly doing here is choking the inner shadow on the box to a solid line, then adjusting the position of that shadow to just stick in on one side. This creates the illustion of a solid line. You won't have to cut up the object, you don't need multiple objects grouped together, the line will always move and adjust with the object, and you don't need to add text to mimic a line. The downsides are that it takes a few minutes to adjust the thickness and position just right, so be sure to turn on your preview; and this works best on 4-sided objects.
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this is a nice answer, but requires the background to be white and this also give me a thin border on the right and left.
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Setting one of the shadows or glows or any of the transparency effects to a solid line is problematic when the page goes to print.
You're basically creating a raster element at infinitly high resolution.
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It's not possible - but it should be.
Yet it is possible in Adobe Muse!!!
Are you listening Adobe? We want this feature in InDesign.
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Use a table with a single cell.
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so it took Adobe 5 years, but now you can...
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You say that, but how does one do it now?
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It's a new feature in CC 2015....
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Sorry, I mixed up this question with paragraph shading and vertical rules.