I have created an InDesign template from which I produce an ~400 page document from the records of ~100 people. (I use this once per quarter, for a job that requires a turnaround of only a couple of hours, so I can ill afford the mucking about I currently have to do to produce the finished doc).
Each person's data contains hundreds of values, most of which are simply numerical values or text fields with just a few words, and my ID doc handles the data merge for this data into multi-column tables just fine.
But each person's records also include up to 39 'Actions' which have greater variability in the length of the values, as shown in the Master page below. As you can see this data is displayed in a table of two columns, which respectively contain placeholders for a graphic and for text, which is flowed across threaded text frames.
Frustratingly in the the merged document any page on which this table has sufficient data such that it should extend into the text frame on the right instead gets an overset text error, without any data displayed in the right hand column. But when I look at the specific pages identified in the overset text report in most cases it is not at all clear why the text supposedly does not fit. Indeed, as shown below, I have found through trial and error that simply enlarging and then contracting the second frame is enough to unearth the data and clear the error. (Typically there will also be a couple of instances of 'legitimate' overset text—where the data doesn't visibly fit in the two text frames—and for these I manually apply a different paragraph style with a compressed typeface).
Here is an example of a merged record which triggers an overset text error and doesn't display properly:
1. As initially displayed (right hand frame not displaying any data)
2. After extending the right hand text frame a tiny bit (now displaying all the data, but somewhat intriguingly still showing the red plus icon in the bottom right of the frame)
3. For the point of completeness (and possible help isolating the cause) if I extend the frame further InDesign appears to think it is displaying everything (no red plus icon)
4. Contracting text frame back to less than original size (but with all the data now visible)
The overset test error is not produced if all the data fits into the first column (i.e. the person has completed ≤25 Actions)
So why is InDesign tripping up?
Is there something about the way I have built the template?
(Alternatively is there something I can look for in the CSV file which might be causing this? FWIW to me it seems unlikely that the source data file is the problem given that the issue seems to be consistently triggered by whether the data would extend into the second column or not.)
Any suggestions gratefully accepted
1 Correct answer
Hi,
I've seen that you have 13 empty table rows on the master page, and I think that's just what cause the overset.
Try removing the unnecessary rows from the master page (you need max 39, right?), I think that way you will stop having problems.
Greetings,
Xavi
11
Replies
Jeffrey_Smith wrote
Are there any GREP styles used in the paragraph style? One possible GREP scenario I see: a no break character style applied to text with .com, so URLs do not break. The line you show where this occurs contains "belindabrosan.com" and prevents text flowing into column until frame is stretched.
Intriguing question.
My initial reaction was to flatly rule it out, because
- I rarely use GREP (would love to speak GREP but suck at it).
- When I've extended the text frame I only did so vertically (so "belindabrosan.com" isn't getting any additional horizontal space)
But I checked the paragraph style just in case. It doesn't have any GREP. However it did include 'Balanced Ragged Lines', which seemed to be in the same ballpark as your suggestion, so I switched that off and tried running the data merge again.
The overset text report was identical. But all the data was displayed! Even if this is as far as I get, at least I'll only manually have to check each instance to see whether there really is overset text, and not have to resize the text frames. Thank you Jeffrey!
Still leaves me scratching my head as to why ID thinks there's overset text. Here's the same example, untouched after the latest data merge. As you can see the data is now displayed in both columns, but the overset text icon is still visible the bottom right corner of the text frame (even though the data clearly fits and the empty placeholders indicate that even if there were 39 pieces of text data it would still likely fit).
Studying the overset text report also revealed that my claim in my first post that "The overset test error is not produced if all the data fits into the first column (i.e. the person has completed ≤25 Actions)" was incorrect.
Here are two really similar examples from the same data merge that easily fit within the left hand text frame, but InDesign reports that the second example has overset text. Both have:
- less than a dozen Actions (so easily fit in the left text frame)
- at least one Action which goes over two lines
Trying to work out why InDesign thinks one is overset and the other isn't is driving me nuts!
puffmoike wrote
… What suggests that I have XML tags?
Colored brackets like the one in my made-up example below.
Open your Story Editor window and see if you can find something like that:
If the XML is not necessary I would remove it from the InDesign template document.
Regards,
Uwe
Laubender wrote
puffmoike wrote
… What suggests that I have XML tags?
Colored brackets like the one in my made-up example below.
Open your Story Editor window and see if you can find something like that:
If the XML is not necessary I would remove it from the InDesign template document.
Regards,
Uwe
So are you suggesting that those coloured brackets are introduced by the content of the CSV file or by something I do when creating the template?
I just tried dragging one of the Data Merge elements (equivalent of 'Action X' in the mockup you very generously produced) onto my Master page and initially it didn't show coloured brackets. But once I ran the data merge it was surrounded by coloured brackets on both the master page and all the relevant pages produced by the merge. In short, I'm not sure how I am meant to create a data merge template without ending up with these coloured brackets.
(why does your Action 1 and Action 5 not have brackets, but the other three do?)
Hi,
I think those brackets are there because of text variables.
They should not pose any problem.
If you want them to disappear (well, they're not going to disappear but you won't see them anymore ;P), you can do it this way (I don't know which name has this option on english version):
Regards,
Xavi
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