Chapter 2: Working with Windows and Views
55
Setting object display options
Generally, you’re going to want to display the objects you’ve placed on your pages. After all, what
appears on-screen is what gets printed, right? Not exactly. For example, text and graphic frames
appear on-screen with blue borders, even if they’re empty, but the borders don’t print. In addition
to the six zoom commands (covered earlier in this chapter), there are several commands that affect
how objects appear:
l
View ➪ Extras ➪ Show/Hide Frame Edges (Control+Ô+H or Ctrl+H): When you
choose Hide Frame Edges, text and graphics frames do not appear with a blue border.
Additionally, an X does not appear in empty graphics frames when frame edges are hid-
den. You might want to hide frame edges to see how a page will look when printed.
Tip
When you move an object by clicking and dragging, you have the choice of displaying the entire object
(including the contents of a frame) or displaying only the bounding box. If you begin dragging immediately
after clicking to select an object, only the bounding box appears as you drag. If you pause after clicking an
object until the stem of the arrow pointer disappears and then begin dragging, the entire object appears. n
l
View ➪ Extras ➪ Show/Hide Text Threads (Option+Ô+Y or Ctrl+Alt+Y): When you
choose Hide Text Threads, the indicator arrows that connect text frames through which a
single story flows do not appear. You thus can’t quickly tell what the text flow is, but you
also no longer have those distracting arrows on-screen.
l
In the Pages panel’s flyout menu, choose View ➪ Show/Hide Master Items. When you
choose Show Master Items, any objects on the currently displayed document page’s mas-
ter page appear. When you choose Hide Master Items, master objects on the currently dis-
played page are hidden. This command is page-specific, so you can show or hide master
objects on a page-by-page basis.
l
View ➪ Extras ➪ Show/Hide Notes: This shows or hides notes embedded in text (see

of the Preferences dialog box.
Note that some of these menu option names toggle between Show and Hide each time you select
them. Therefore, if the menu option begins with Hide, it means that attribute is currently being
displayed; if it starts with Show, it means the attribute is currently not being displayed.
New Feature
The Show/Hide Frame Edges, Show/Hide Text Threads, Show/Hide Notes, and Show/Hide Hyperlinks menu
options have been moved from the View menu to the new Extras submenu in the View menu. The Show/Hide
Live Corners and Show/Hide Content Grabber options are new to InDesign CS5. n
Cross-Reference
Chapter 3 explains how to set grid and guideline defaults. Chapter 7 explains how to use grids. Chapter 10
explains how to use guidelines. Chapter 12 covers live corners, while Chapter 13 covers the content grabber. n
Using screen modes
As Chapter 1 noted, InDesign has five screen mode options at the bottom of the Tools panel,
which you can also access by choosing View ➪ Screen Mode ➪ submenu.
The Normal screen mode is the view you usually work in, so the pasteboard, frame edges, text
threads, and the like are visible as you work, to make object selection and manipulation easier. (As
noted earlier in this chapter, you can separately control which of those InDesign indicators dis-
plays when in Normal screen mode.)
The Preview mode shows the document as if it were printed or exported to a PDF or Flash file, so
you can see what the user will see. You can still edit and otherwise manipulate your layout in this
screen mode, but you can’t see layout aids such as frame edges except for that of the currently
selected objects. The Bleed and Slug modes are variations of the Preview mode that show any
objects in the bleed or slug areas beyond the page boundaries; Chapter 4 explains bleeds and slugs.
New Feature
The Presentation screen mode is new to InDesign CS5. It lets you show your InDesign layout as if it were a
slideshow, such as for making client presentations either in person or over a screen-sharing service. (If you use
a screen-sharing service, initiate the sharing session first, then switch to the Presentation screen mode.) n
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Chapter 2: Working with Windows and Views

just the panels and menu customizations you want for the task at hand.
InDesign provides several types of view controls. You can zoom in or out of your document using
any of several options: the Zoom tool, the Zoom field, the Zoom Level pop-up menu, gestures,
keyboard shortcuts, or the quick zoom function.
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Part I: Welcome to InDesign
58
You can also scroll through your document to change the view focus using the scroll bars, the
Hand tool, gestures, or the quick zoom function.
InDesign also lets you control what layout aids appear for objects in your layout, such as frame
edges, text threads, rulers, grids, and guidelines. And it lets you change screen mode, such as to
preview what the layout will look like to a reader.
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59
CHAPTER
Setting InDesign
Preferences
IN THIS CHAPTER
Knowing where preferences
are stored
Setting preferences for
documents and the
application
Customizing keyboard
shortcuts and menu options
Setting defaults for
documents, text, and objects
Creating default colors and

To make a preference apply to all new documents, you have to change that preference when no
documents are open. Then they become universal preferences (you don’t even have to close
InDesign for them to set). Well, almost universal: Documents created before you set those univer-
sal preferences retain their own preferences just as do documents created by other people on their
computers.
To change universal preferences, make sure no document is open, and then change whatever pref-
erences you want.
InDesign Defaults file
The preferences you set in InDesign, from measurement units to color-calibration settings, are all
stored in the InDesign Defaults file:
l
On the Mac, this file is in the
Users:current user:Library:Preferences:Adobe

InDesign:Version

7.0
folder on the drive that contains the Mac OS X
System

folder.
l
In Windows XP, it is in the
\Document

and

Settings\current user\
Application


Note
If you make changes to preferences while a document is open, the changes save with that document and not in
the InDesign Defaults file. The document remembers its own preference settings so that it looks the same when
it’s opened on other computers running InDesign. n
Presets folder
The Presets folder — which is inside the folder containing the InDesign application — contains
eight kinds of stored preferences: shortcut sets, color swatch libraries, workspaces, auto-correction
tables, find/change tables, the button library, page transitions, and motion presets. (The other four
subfolders in the Presets folder contain internal settings such as for Web and Flash export and for
InDesign’s startup display; they should be left unmodified.)
The latter two relate to InDesign’s interface, not preferences related to your work. Because these
preferences are stored in files, they can be copied to other users’ Presets folders to help ensure con-
sistent options among all users in a workgroup. Here are the eight folders that contain users’ stored
preferences:
l
Autocorrect: This folder includes XML documents that store the automatic text-correc-
tion rules that appear in the Autocorrect pane of the Preferences dialog box — both those
that come with InDesign and those you add yourself (see Chapter 19). If you are knowl-
edgeable in XML, you can edit this file to add more correction rules outside of InDesign
(which may be helpful for a production programmer, for example).
l
Button Library: This folder contains a standard InDesign library file named
ButtonLibrary.indll
that contains the buttons defined in the Buttons panel.
l
Find-Change Queries: This folder’s subfolders include XML documents that store com-
mon find/change queries, such as replacing two paragraph returns with one, as shown in
the Query pop-up menu of the Find/Change dialog box (see Chapter 19). If you are
knowledgeable in XML, you can edit these files to add more correction rules outside of
InDesign.

New Feature
The Motion Presets folder is new to InDesign CS5. The Page Sizes folder and its
New

Doc

Sizes.txt
file are
gone in InDesign CS5, removing that manual way of setting up document presets (see Chapter 4). n
Cross-Reference
I cover workspaces in Chapter 2; shortcut sets later in this chapter; document creation in Chapter 4; swatch
libraries in Chapter 8; search and replace and auto-correction in Chapter 19; glyph sets in Chapter 23; buttons
and page transitions in Chapter 34; and scripts in Chapter 37. n
Using the Preferences Dialog Box
Preferences are settings that affect an entire document — such as what measurement system you’re
using on rulers, what color the guides are, and whether substituted fonts are highlighted. In
InDesign, you access most of these settings through the Preferences dialog box: Choose InDesign ➪
Preferences ➪ desired pane or press Ô+K on the Mac, or choose Edit ➪ Preferences ➪ desired pane or
press Ctrl+K in Windows. They are stored in the InDesign Defaults file in your InDesign applica-
tion folder.
Note
You must select a specific pane from the Preferences submenu. For example, you might choose InDesign ➪
Preferences ➪ Composition on the Mac or Edit ➪ Preferences ➪ Composition in Windows. If you use the key-
board shortcut Ô+K or Ctrl+K, you get the General pane, from which you can then select the desired pane
from the list on the left. n
The Preferences dialog box provides 18 types of settings divided into panes: General, Interface,
Type, Advanced Type, Composition, Units & Increments, Grids, Guides & Pasteboard, Dictionary,
Spelling, Autocorrect, Notes, Track Changes, Story Editor Display, Display Performance,
Appearance of Black, File Handling, and Clipboard Handling.
Go to each pane for which you want to change preferences, make your changes, and when done

64
l
Absolute Numbering: This option, which I prefer, shows page numbers according to
each page’s position in the document. For example, the first page is 1, the second page is
2, and the third page is 3, even if the pages display the Roman numerals i, ii, and iii.
When this option is selected, you can always jump to the first page in a document by
typing 1 in the Page Number box.
Font Downloading and Embedding area
The Always Subset Fonts with Glyph Counts Greater Than field is used for OpenType fonts that
have many special characters, such as accented letters, symbols, and diacritical marks. To prevent
output files from getting clogged with very large font files, this option lets you set the maximum
number of characters (glyphs) that can be downloaded from a font file into an output file. Any
characters actually used are always downloaded; the reason you might want to download an entire
font is so that someone could edit the file as a PDF or EPS file and have access to all characters in
the proper fonts for such editing.
Object Editing area
If selected, the new Prevent Selection of Locked Objects stops the mouse from being able to select
a locked object (see Chapter 13). If deselected, you can select a locked object with the mouse but
must still unlock it to work with it.
New Feature
The Prevent Selection of Locked Object option is new to InDesign CS5, and gone is the Enable Attached Scripts
option: You can no longer control whether a script automatically runs if a menu invokes it; instead, all such
scripts now run automatically. n
The When Scaling control has two options:
l
When the Apply to Content radio button is selected and you resize an object with no
stroke, InDesign displays the new scale whether you select the object using the Selection
tool or you select its content using the Direct Selection tool. This option makes it easy to
see what objects have had their content scaled when selected with the Selection tool.
l

The new Enable Multi-Touch Gestures option, if selected, lets you use finger gestures
instead of the mouse on touch-enabled devices, such as recent MacBooks and on
Windows 7–based touchscreen PCs.
The Panels area offers these controls:
l
The Floating Tools Panel pop-up menu lets you set the Tools panel as double-column width,
single row, or the default single-column width. This is a matter of personal preference.
l
If the Auto-Collapse Icon Panels option is selected, InDesign automatically closes an open
panel when the mouse is no longer within that panel. But this feature works only if the
main dock has been collapsed and you are accessing the panels from it in that collapsed
view. (Free-floating panels are not affected.)
l
The Auto-Show Hidden Panels option, if selected, adds dark gray borders to the sides of
the InDesign window when you hide panels by pressing Tab. Hover the mouse over the
left border to redisplay the Tools panel; hover over the right border to redisplay the main
dock. (Press Tab again to get all panels back.)
l
The Open Documents as Tabs option, if selected, puts new documents into tabs rather
than in free-floating windows. It is enabled by default.
l
The new Enable Floating Document Window Docking option, if selected (the default),
docks a document window into the document tab bar (see Chapter 2) when you drag the
window to the bar. If deselected, document windows are not docked when dragged into
the tab bar.
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Part I: Welcome to InDesign
66
The Options area offers these controls:

Thanks to the iPhone, touch-based computer interaction is becoming increasingly common. Still, only
newer computers support multiple-finger touch (called multitouch) gestures: For Macs, you can use the
trackpads in a MacBook Air, a 2008 or newer model MacBook Pro, or a 2009 or newer model MacBook,
or you can use the surface of an Apple Magic Mouse. For PCs, you need a touchscreen-equipped PC run-
ning Windows 7 (or running an earlier version of Windows with the Pen and Tablet extensions installed).
Remember: To use gestures, you place the number of fingertips indicated on the trackpad or touch-
screen and then move them as described.
On a Mac, you can use these gestures:
l
Zoom in or out: Use the pinch gesture (two fingertips moving closer) to zoom in and the
expand gesture (two fingers moving apart) to zoom out.
l
Rotate: Use the rotate gesture (twisting two fingertips clockwise or counterclockwise) to rotate
selected objects. If no objects are selected, your pasteboard is rotated in 90-degree increments.
l
Scroll: Drag two fingers up, down, left, or right as desired, based on where you want to scroll
the screen.
l
Page up and down: Use the swipe gesture (drag three fingertips from right to left); to scroll to
the previous page, swipe from left to right. (The swipe gesture acts as if you were pressing
Page Up and Page Down keys.)
In Windows, you can use these gestures:
l
Zoom in or out: Use the pinch gesture (two fingertips moving closer) to zoom in and the
expand gesture (two fingers moving apart) to zoom out. You can also double-tap to zoom into
where you tapped.
l
Rotate: Use the rotate gesture (twisting two fingertips clockwise or counterclockwise) to rotate
selected objects. If no objects are selected, your pasteboard is rotated in 90-degree increments.
l

l
Automatically Use Correct Optical Size: When selected, this option automatically
accesses OpenType and PostScript fonts that include an optimal size axis, which ensures
optimal readability at any size.
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Chapter 3: Setting InDesign Preferences
69
l
Triple Click to Select a Line: When this option is selected, InDesign lets you triple-click
anywhere in a line to select the whole line. This used to be a standard shortcut in Mac
applications but has fallen into disuse.
l
Apply Leading to Entire Paragraphs: If this option is selected, InDesign applies leading
changes to the entire paragraph as opposed to the current line. In most cases, you want
the leading (the spacing between lines) to be applied to all paragraphs, so I recommend
that you select this option. (It is not selected by default in InDesign.)
l
Adjust Spacing Automatically When Cutting and Pasting Words: This option is
selected by default and adds or deletes spaces around words when you cut and paste so
that words don’t abut or have too many spaces next to them.
l
Font Preview Size: If selected, this option displays a preview in all menus in which lists
of fonts appear. The preview shows the actual font so that you can see what you’ll get
before selecting the font. The pop-up menu at right lets you select the size of the preview.
Figure 3.4 shows an example. Note that if you have lots of fonts, the preview menu size
quickly becomes unwieldy.
FIGURE 3.4
Example of a font menu that appears when Font Preview Size is selected and set to
medium size

(reduced and dropped below the baseline), or Small Caps (reduced versions of capital letters). Note
that Superscript, Subscript, and Small Caps characters do not need to be reduced — they can actually
be enlarged instead. The controls in the Advanced Type pane govern precisely how these characters
are placed and resized, as well as control the handling on non-Latin text entry.
FIGURE 3.5
The Advanced Type pane of the Preferences dialog box (the default settings are shown)
Character Settings area
This area controls the size of subscripts, superscripts, and small caps:
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Chapter 3: Setting InDesign Preferences
71
l
The Size fields let you specify how much to scale these characters. The default is 58.3
percent, but you can type a value between 1 and 200 percent. I prefer 60 or 65 percent,
depending on the type size and font.
l
The Position fields let you specify how much to shift Superscript characters up and
Subscript characters down. The default is 33.3 percent, but you can type a value between
–500 and 500 percent. I prefer 30 percent for subscripts and 35 percent for superscripts.
l
The Small Cap field lets you specify the scale of Small Caps characters in relation to the
actual capital letters in the font. The default is 70 percent, but you can type a value
between 1 and 200 percent.
Input Method Options area
The Use Inline Input for Non-Latin Text option enables input method editors (IMEs) from
Microsoft, Apple, or other companies, if installed on your computer, for typing Chinese-,
Japanese-, and Korean-language (CJK) characters on non-CJK operating systems. It’s meant for the
occasional use of CJK characters. If you publish regularly in these languages, you should use the
appropriate CJK version of InDesign.

or loose for readability reasons.
l
Substituted Fonts: This option is selected by default and uses pink highlight to indicate
characters in fonts not available to InDesign. InDesign actually uses Adobe Sans MM or
Adobe Serif MM to create a replacement for missing fonts so that the text looks as close as
possible to the actual font. For editing purposes, the substituted fonts work fine, although
the pink highlight can be distracting. But for output purposes, it’s important that you have
the correct fonts, so you may want to live with the irritation and have InDesign highlight
substituted fonts for you.
l
Substituted Glyphs: This option highlights in yellow any glyphs (special characters) that
are substituted. This usually occurs when you have multiple versions of the same font,
with different special characters in each version. For example, a file using the euro (€) cur-
rency symbol might have been created in the newest version of, say, Syntax. But a copy
editor working on the same file may have an older version of Syntax that doesn’t have the
euro symbol in it. Selecting Substituted Glyphs ensures that such a problem is highlighted.
Substituted Glyphs also highlights characters of an OpenType font that have been changed
on the fly by turning on some OpenType features from the Control panel’s or Character
panel’s flyout menu, such as Discretionary Ligatures, Swashes, Small Caps, Slash Zero,
and so on. I recommend you select this option.
Note
InDesign is hypersensitive to fonts (see Chapter 20), so you’ll get such highlighting even when you have the
correct font installed but the wrong face applied to it (such as Normal rather than Regular); in these cases, the
font style will have brackets ([ ]) around it in the Character or Control panel. n
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Chapter 3: Setting InDesign Preferences
73
Text Wrap area
As the label makes clear, the three options here affect how text wraps:

and center of where the two pages meet.
With the Horizontal and Vertical pop-up menus, you can specify one measurement system for the
horizontal ruler and measurements and specify another measurement system for the vertical ruler
and measurements. For example, you might use points for horizontal measurements so that you
can use the rulers to gauge tab and indent settings while using inches for vertical measurements. If
you use inches for both the Horizontal and Vertical Ruler Units, not only do the rulers display
inches, but the X, Y, W, and H fields on the Control panel (choose Window ➪ Control or press
Option+Ô+6 or Ctrl+Alt+6) or Transform panel (choose Window ➪ Object & Layout ➪ Transform)
display values in inches as well.
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Part I: Welcome to InDesign
74
FIGURE 3.7
The Units & Increments pane of the Preferences dialog box (the default settings for print documents are
shown)
Note
To display the document ruler, choose View ➪ Show Ruler or press Ô+R or Ctrl+R. n
Tip
The default horizontal and vertical measurement system is picas. If you aren’t accustomed to working in picas,
be sure to change the default Horizontal and Vertical Ruler Units when no documents are open. Changing the
default this way ensures that all future documents use your preferred measurement system. (If you make the
change with a document open, the change applies only to the open document.) n
To specify the measurement systems you want to use, click an option from the Horizontal pop-up
menu and from the Vertical pop-up menu. The following options are available:
l
Points: A typesetting measurement equal to
1
⁄
72