I'm currently producing a book every Bob Dylan song in it for his publisher. It's a huge project and I'm indexing. I've noticed something very odd with InDesign's indexing system, which is that it's only possible to alphabetise letter-by-letter, so if these were song titles, I'd get this (in this order):

I Dream
I'm Asking
I'm Falling
I Win

Of course, what I want is word-by-word indexing, which would give me the (correct) following:

I Dream
I Win
I'm Asking
I'm Falling

I know I can tweak these entries manually, and I have done but it's laborious and risky. I then match my index order with one automatically generated in Microsoft Excel, which does order word-by-word. In fact I am copying across the Excel list and superimposing it on the InDesign generated index to make sure they're the same. It's such an odd omission that I keep thinking I must have missed an option, but apparently this is the only way InDesign knows how to order alphabetically. Very weird.

I write long traditional books with hundreds of black and white text pages. Adobe's focus as a graphics company may be why it misses some important issues for people like me. Editing hundreds of pages of text and incorporating feedback is extremely difficult.

To accomplish this I have to get the full layout correct with many chapters all in individual files and then create a PDF version of the book. of course, when viewed two up the pages don' align properly if I don't insert a blank page as the first page using DC. Simple fix, give me a proofing copy to eliminate this step.

Second, when I get that edited pdf file back I have to put the two side by side and go through the entire book chapter file by chapter file and painstakingly match the feedback to the chapter. Of course, you only let me view my pages two up so I have to tediously use my mouse to move back and forth even on my 32 inch screen. Let me view my pages in editing mode, one at a time and scroll down just with the arrow keys.

Better yet, build a proofing copy of the book where I see all elements of the book together at one time and allow me to make all edits there.

Even better yet, interactively layer the PDF edits I receive in this proofing copy so I have everything I need right in one document view to make all the edits.

You need to give me more power to work on the book as a book and stop limiting me to working file by file. I have lots of chapters, front matter, TOC, Glossary, appendix, marketing pages, etc. It is a massive pain to deal with each of these as an independent file with independent formatting, even if you have improved the syncing of styles and master pages. I need one book wide set of styles and master pages.

Finally, to end my editing driven mad rant, built on the editing copy discussed above, give me a full index generating tool with the ability to build a master multi-book list of terms. The only thing worse than editing a 300 page book is building the index. Your concept of coding each instance of the word manually in a 300 page document isn't even doable at this scale.

I use the book feature for many, if not most of the documents that I create. Each individual InDesign document included within the book is a new chapter. Because the majority of my clients request printed copies of the documents I create, I usually create customized tab pages that precede each chapter, so that the end user can easily find a specific section. These tabs are printed on card stock instead of the standard bond paper that is used for the content of the document.

The majority of my documents require page numbers, and so I use the feature where the page numbering is continued from the previous document within the book file.

It makes sense to be able to create a tab as a single page within each individual chapter page. However, when the tab page is included in each chapter, that tab page is counted as a page and given a page number, as if it was just another page within the body of the document.

So, now I create a separate document for all of the tabs, and when I have to manually relocate all of the tabs into their proper location when I export to a PDF, or have to provide very specific instructions to my printer when having the document printed and bound.

It would be ideal if there was a setting at the Master Page level that allowed me to designate certain page types as not to be included in automatic page numbering.

In some jurisdictions they may have to have line numbers, but not in Federal or any that I practice in.

A TOA is a table containing the name of all cases, statutes and other authorities used in the document and the page reference.

One complex is that the reference in the table may be slighly different from that in the text.

The table entry may look liked

ABC v. XYZ, 123 F.3d 456 (12th Cir. 1992) .... 4, 5, 10, 16

The references in the text may look like

ABC v. XYZ, 123 F.3d 456, 460-461 (12th Cir. 1992)
ABC 123 F.3d at 465

Currently, the color of the hidden conditional text indicator is orange. But why orange?why not something more useful? We are able to assign specific colors to each condition, so why not extend those colors to the hidden conditional text indicator as well? Right now, in order to see which condition is applied to hidden conditional text, we have to hover over it and hope that the tooltip pops up. Like this: http://documentgeek.blogspot.com/2011/06/how-to-see-hidden-conditional-text-in.html

But if there are number of hidden conditions, that trick doesn't work. At the very least, color-code the eyeball in the story editor. In the story editor, you can see that the table icon )right below the eyeball) displays the conditional text indicator (wavy underlines). The eyeball should display the conditional text indictor as well.

And the orange symbol should be gray,like the color of the condition.