Dear Adobe InDesign Team,

Please simplify how users specify left-to-right Western language text boxes and documents versus right-to-left Middle Eastern language text boxes and documents in the multi language version of InDesign.

There are no fewer that four places where paragraph direction and language specification appear in various places in the InDesign workspace.

Users would benefit from simplification of language-switching tools, because InDesign's interface does not readily expose what language text direction it is using and sometimes switches paragraph direction without users knowing what these international language settings are defaulting to.

My issue had to do with US English text showing up properly in a text box, but when I tried to format a numbered list using the tab bar, the tab margin indicators were reversed, and I could not set up tabs.

Issues also show up when a text box is identified as US English, but InDesign's dictionary thinks the texts is a right-to-left language and marks every word misspelled.

Pleases simplify how languages are specified and have InDesign automatically switch paragraph direction once the user determines the language of the document.

The only exception needed is when foreign words are embedded in text and need to appear right-to-left within a left-to-right text environment (or visa versa) — or when a document needs to be dual-language.

Thanks for your help.

Tom Nimen