Revealing Hidden Objects With Preflight Profiles

Normally, once you hide an object in an InDesign document (via Object > Hide, pressing Command+3/Ctrl+3, or clicking the object’s Show/Hide button in the Layers panel), it leaves few traces of its presence. Hidden objects aren’t printed or exported, and they won’t show up in a Find/Change. They can, however, still affect other objects with text wrap.

But if you really want to give these objects nowhere to hide, use a preflight profile to reveal them.

From the Preflight Panel menu, choose Define Profiles. Click the + (plus) button to create a new preflight profile. Give your new profile a name, and in the IMAGES and OBJECTS options, select Hidden Page Items (plus whatever other conditions you want InDesign to check for).



Click OK, and then select your new profile from the panel menu. If there are any hidden objects, they will be listed as errors and you can double-click them in the panel to jump to their location in the document.



But you still won't see them until you show them (by pressing Command+Option+3/Ctrl+Alt+3, or choosing Object > Show All on Spread, or clicking the object’s Show/Hide button in the Layers panel).

With tools like these you can be the World Champion of Hide and Seek
(at least inside InDesign).

Using Gridify With Multi-Page Documents

Did you ever need to create a grid of pages from a multi-page document, like perhaps thumbnail images of pages from a book?

InDesign's Gridify feature seems like the perfect tool for this job, but if you try it with a multi-page document like a PDF, it seems not to work (you can only draw one frame at a time instead of a grid of them). But there are two simple tricks you can use to make the magic happen and create a grid of pages.

1. When you select your multi-page file for placing (PDF, INDD, or AI), turn on the Create Static Captions checkbox in the Place dialog box.



2. Or simply select a second file to place in addition to the multi-page document.


With either method, make sure you also select Show Import Options (or hold down the Shift key when you click Open in the Place dialog box) so you can select All pages.



Then use Gridify as normal: click and drag to define the height and width of the grid, and use your keyboard arrow keys to define the number of rows and columns.



If possible, make a grid with the exact number of pages you want to place. Then just switch to a different tool to dump either the captions or the extra file (the one that you loaded just to trick the Gridify feature into working).



If the number of pages in the document you're placing is less than the number of frames in your grid, you'll have to delete the extraneous captions/image.

Rotation: Clockwise or Counter-clockwise?

Have you ever had that moment of doubt as to which direction InDesign’s rotation angle is going to move your object? Are positive numbers clockwise or counter-clockwise?

I can’t remember myself, but there’s a little cheat that helps me look smart in front of a class. Just take a quick peek at the Rotation tool in the Tools panel. Notice that it indicates a counter-clockwise direction.



That’s your clue that positive numbers rotate objects counter-clockwise.



Negative numbers go clockwise.



This half-second glance saves me a lot of undos.

Super Fast Table Editing in Adobe InDesign

Want to change the number of rows or columns in a table really fast?

With the Type tool, move your cursor over the bottom or right edge of the table. When the cursor changes to a double arrow, click and hold, then press and hold Option/Alt and drag to the right to create more columns. Or drag down to create more rows.

This trick works in reverse too, so you can remove rows and columns by dragging up or to the left while holding Option/Alt.