Can't assign shortcuts to paragraph styles, can't apply them to multiple pages

[soom1976]

I'm on a MacBook Pro, Os 10.5.8, Indesign CS3

I'm trying to apply Paragraph style (followed by another one) to multiple pages, but it seems to be impossible to do.

First thing - I cannot assign a keyboard shortcut to any of the Paragraph Style commands - when I try to asign a shortcut inside the style window, it doesn't let me do it. I tried all the keys - nothing (I don't have a numpad and I don't have a spare keyboard to try it...)

Second - my story is divided - each page has individual text frame – so I cannot apply styles to the whole story, as it would be in a book.

And I cannot find any script that would do the trick for me, although it seems like something not very complicated...

As a result I have to go through 100 pages one by one and move my mouse around from selecting text to the Paragraph Styles panel, then right click, then apply the styles, and then go to next page and repeat. This is REALLY frustrating...

Any advises?

Thanks.

[Eugene Tyson]

You can only apply Paragraph and Character Styles Shortcuts with numbers, a number pad is  handy for this.

And it has to be with a combination with the CMD key, like CMD1

You can add other keys with this CMD OPT SHIFT 1 for example, or CMD OPT 1

As you're on a MacBook Pro - the numberpad keys are usually hit with a FN and I think the number keys are in the letters, jkl iop, or something like that.

I'm not a Mac user - I'm sure a Mac user would be be more descriptive in getting this to work for you.

I think this plugin allows you to assign any key as a shortcut for a style http://www.dtptools.com/product.asp?id=blid

[soom1976]

Hi Eugene

I tried to assign numbers both with and without CMD key - didn't work. The nupad with the Fn key doesn't exist on my macbook pro - I think it was only on older models...

[Kim Forbes]

On a PC: Make sure your NumberLock is on.  Press <Shift> and any number on number pad.

[John Hawkinson]

InDesign only lets you use the numeric keypad for paragraph style shortcuts.

You can use a one line script, like

app.selection[0].appliedParagraphStyle='MyParagraphStyle';

and assign whatever keyboard shortcut you like to the script.

As for your second question, it doesn't sound hard, but are there other text frames in the document?

It might be better to use one of the existing scripts to link text frames into a single threaded story (with frame breaks).

But are you asking for a script to apply a paragraph style to all the text stories in a document? That's pretty easy. Or does it need to filter them somehow and be pickier about which ones it operates on?

[soom1976]

John

sorry for my ignorance - I'm not a scriptwriter - how do I create this script?

As for the second question - in my case there is only one text frame on each page with exactly the same formatting, just the text differs. So I suppose a script could apply the selected paragraph style on selected pages.. or maybe it could ask for each text frame through the document...

I wonder why there is no way to set a shortcut to an existing command in the Paragraph Styles panel right click menu...

[John Hawkinson]

sorry for my ignorance - I'm not a scriptwriter - how do I create this script?

Save as a plain text file (not RTF!) in TextEdit, for instance as stylename.jsx, and then put it in your user scripts folder. See http://www.danrodney.com/scripts/directions-installingscripts.html for more info.

As for the second question - in my case there is only one text frame on each page with exactly the same formatting, just the text differs. So I suppose a script could apply the selected paragraph style on selected pages.. or maybe it could ask for each text frame through the document...

OK, then try:

app.activeDocument.stories.everyItem().appliedParagraphStyle="whatever";

I wonder why there is no way to set a shortcut to an existing command in the Paragraph Styles panel right click menu...

Well, my understanding is that InDesign made a decision to divide the keyboard into two areas, one of which has keyboard shortcuts that are defined by a user, saved in preferences, and associated with commands. The other (the number pad) has shortcuts associated with paragraph styles, and which travel with the document. With rigid seperation between.