Exporting

You can save all or part of an InDesign story in file formats that you can open later in other applications. Each story in a document exports to a separate document.

InDesign can export text in several file formats, which are listed in the Export dialog box. The formats listed are used by other applications, and they may retain many of the type specifications, indents, and tabs set in your document.

You can save sections of commonly used text and page layout items as snippets.

To retain all formatting, use the Adobe InDesign Tagged Text export filter. For more information, view the Tagged Text PDF at www.adobe.com/go/learn_id_taggedtext_cs5_en (PDF).

Exporting content for the web

To repurpose InDesign content for the web, you have several options:

Export a selection or the entire document to a basic, unformatted HTML document. You can link to images on a server or create a separate folder for images. You can then use any HTML editor, such as Adobe Dreamweaver®, to format the content for the web. See Export content to Dreamweaver (CS5).

Copy text or images from the InDesign document and paste it into your HTML editor.

Export a document to Adobe PDF and post the PDF on the web. The PDF can include interactive elements such as movies, sound clips, buttons, and page transitions. See Dynamic PDF documents.

Export a document or book as a reflowable XHTML-based eBook that is compatible with the Adobe Digital Editions reader software. See Export content for EPUB (CS5).

For advanced repurposing workflows, export the content from InDesign in XML format, which you can then import into an HTML editor such as Dreamweaver. See Working with XML.

Export content to Dreamweaver (CS5)

Exporting to XHTML is an easy way to get your InDesign contents into web-ready form. When you export contents to XHTML, you can control how text and images are exported. InDesign preserves the names of paragraph, character, object, table, and cell styles applied to the exported contents by marking the XHTML contents with CSS style classes of the same name. Using Adobe Dreamweaver or any CSS-capable HTML editor, you can quickly apply formatting and layout to the contents.

InDesign exports all stories, linked and embedded graphics, SWF movie files, footnotes, text variables (as text), bulleted and numbered lists, internal cross-references, and hyperlinks that jump to text or web pages. Tables are also exported, but certain formatting, such as table and cell strokes, is not exported. Tables are assigned unique IDs, so they can be referenced as Spry data sets in Dreamweaver.

InDesign does not export objects you draw (such as rectangles, ovals, and polygons), movie files (except for SWF), hyperlinks (except for links to web pages and links applied to text that jump to text anchors in the same document), pasted objects (including pasted Illustrator images), text converted to outlines, XML tags, books, bookmarks, SING glyphlets, page transitions, index markers, objects on the pasteboard that aren’t selected and don’t touch the page, or parent page items (unless they’re overridden or selected before export).

A document with the specified name and an .html extension (such as “newsletter.html”) is created; if specified, a web images subfolder (such as “newsletter-web-images”) is saved in the same location.

XHTML export options

In the XHTML dialog box (File > Export For > Dreamweaver), specify the following options.

General options

The General area includes the following options.

Determines whether only the selected items or the entire document is exported. If a text frame is selected, the entire story—including overset text—is exported.

If Document is selected, all page items from all spreads are exported, except for parent page items that have not been overridden and page items on invisible layers. XML tags and generated indexes and tables of contents are also ignored.

Select Map To Unordered List to convert bullet paragraphs into List Items, which are formatted in HTML using the <ul> tag. Select Convert To Text to format using the <p> tag with bullet characters as text.

Use either the page order or XML structure to determine the reading order of page objects.

If Base On Page Layout is selected, InDesign determines the reading order of page objects by scanning left to right and top to bottom. In some instances, especially in complex, multi-column documents, the design elements may not appear in the desired reading order. Use Dreamweaver to rearrange and format the contents.

If Base On Page Layout is selected, InDesign determines the reading order of page objects according to the document’s binding (left to right or right to left). In some instances, especially in complex, multi-column documents, the exported design elements may not appear in the desired reading order. Use Dreamweaver to rearrange and format the contents.

If Same As XML Structure is selected, the XML Structure panel controls the ordering of the exported content and which content gets exported. If your content is already tagged, you can simply drag the tags in the XML Structure panel to set the XHTML Export order. If your content is not tagged, you can choose Add Untagged Items from the Structure panel menu to generate tags that you can reorder. If you do not want an item to be included in the export, you can simply delete the tag in the XML Structure panel. (Deleting a tag does not delete the content from the INDD file.) See Tag page items.

Determines how numbers are converted in the HTML file.

Converts numbered lists into List Items, which are formatted in HTML using the <ol> tag.

Converts numbered lists into List Items, but assigns a <value> attribute based on the paragraph’s current number in InDesign.

Converts numbered lists into paragraphs that begin with the paragraph’s current number as text.

Images options

From the Copy Images menu, determine how images are exported to HTML.

Exports the original image to the web images subfolder. When this option is selected, all other options are dimmed.

Lets you change settings to determine how the image is exported.

Preserves InDesign formatting, such as rotation or scale, as much as possible for web images.

Lets you choose whether the optimized images in your document are converted to GIF or JPEG. Choose Automatic to let InDesign decide which format to use in each instance.

Lets you control how InDesign handles colors when optimizing GIF files. The GIF format uses a limited color palette, which cannot exceed 256 colors.

Choose Adaptive (No Dither) to create a palette using a representative sample of colors in the graphic without any dithering (mixing of small spots of colors to simulate additional colors). Choose Web to create a palette of web-safe colors that are a subset of Windows and Mac OS system colors. Choose System (Win) or System (Mac) to create a palette using the built-in system color palette. This choice may cause unexpected results.

Determines the trade-off between compression (for smaller file sizes) and image quality for each JPEG image created. Low produces the smallest file and lowest image quality.

Determines how quickly JPEG graphics display when the file containing the image is opened on the web. Choose Progressive to make the JPEG images display gradually and in increasing detail as they are downloaded. (Files created with this option are slightly larger and require more RAM for viewing.) Choose Baseline to make each JPEG file display only after it has been completely downloaded; a placeholder appears in its place until the file displays.

Rather than exporting images to a subfolder, this option lets you enter a local URL (such as “images/”) that appears in front of the image file. In the HTML code, the link attribute displays the path and extension you specify. This option is especially effective when you’re converting images to web-compatible images yourself.

Advanced options

Use the Advanced area to set CSS and JavaScript options.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) are a collection of formatting rules that control the appearance of content in a web page. When you use CSS to format a page, you separate content from presentation. The content of your page—the HTML code—resides in the HTML file itself, while the CSS rules defining the presentation of the code reside in another file (an external style sheet) or within the HTML document (usually in the Head section). For example, you can specify different font sizes for selected text, and you can use CSS to control the format and positioning of block-level elements in a web page.

When exporting to XHTML, you can create a list of CSS styles that appears in the Head section of the HTML file with declarations (attributes).

If Include Style Definitions is selected, InDesign attempts to match the attributes of the InDesign text formatting with CSS equivalents. If this option is deselected, the HTML file includes empty declarations. You can edit later these declarations in Dreamweaver.

If Preserve Local Overrides is selected, local formatting such as italic or bold is included.

Selecting this option omits the CSS section from the HTML file.

Specify the URL of the existing CSS style sheet, which is usually a relative URL, such as “/styles/style.css.” InDesign does not check whether the CSS exists or is valid, so you’ll want to use Dreamweaver to confirm your external CSS setup.

Select Link To External JavaScript to run a JavaScript when the HTML page is opened. Specify the URL of the JavaScript, which is usually a relative URL. InDesign does not check whether the JavaScript exists or is valid.

Export content for EPUB (CS5)

You can export a document or book as a reflowable eBook in EPUB format that is compatible with the Adobe Digital Editions reader software.

InDesign creates a single .epub file containing the XHTML-based content. The exported file includes a JPEG thumbnail image from the first page in the specified document (or the style source document if a book was selected). This thumbnail is used to depict the book in the Digital Editions Reader library view. To view the file, you need the Digital Editions software, which you can download free from the Adobe website.

EPUB resources

For more information on the EPUB format, see www.idpf.org.

Download a free copy of the Digital Editions reader at www.adobe.com/products/digital-editions.html.

Digital Editions General export options

The General section of the Digital Editions Export Options dialog box includes the following options.

The metadata from the document (or the style source document if a book was selected) is included with the exported file.

Specify the publisher information that appears in the eBook metadata. You may want you to specify a URL for the publisher so that someone who receives the eBook can visit the web page and purchase the eBook.

Every EPUB document requires a unique identifier. You can specify the unique identifier attribute. If you leave this field empty, a unique identifier is automatically created.

If you select Base On Page Layout, the reading order of the page items in the EPUB is determined by their location on the page. InDesign reads from left to right and top to bottom. If you want more control over the reading order, use the XML Tags panel to tag your page items. If you select Same As XML Structure, the order of the tags in Structure View determines the reading order. See Tag page items.

Select Map To Unordered List to convert bullet paragraphs into List Items, which are formatted in HTML using the <ul> tag. Select Convert To Text to format using the <p> tag with bullet characters as text.

Determines how numbers are converted in the HTML file.

Converts numbered lists into List Items, which are formatted in HTML using the <ol> tag.

Converts numbered lists into List Items, but assigns a <value> attribute based on the paragraph’s current number in InDesign.

Converts numbered lists into paragraphs that begin with the paragraph’s current number as text.

Starts the Adobe Digital Editions Reader, if present. An alert message appears if your system doesn’t have a reader configured to view .epub documents.

Digital Editions Images options

The Images section of the Digital Editions Export Options dialog box includes the following options. From the Image Conversion menu, determine how images are exported to HTML.

Preserves InDesign formatting, such as rotation or scale, as much as possible for web images.

Lets you choose whether the optimized images in your document are converted to GIF or JPEG. Choose Automatic to let InDesign decide which format to use in each instance.

Lets you control how InDesign handles colors when optimizing GIF files. The GIF format uses a limited color palette, which cannot exceed 256 colors.

Choose Adaptive to create a palette using a representative sample of colors in the graphic without any dithering (mixing of small spots of colors to simulate additional colors). Choose Web to create a palette of web-safe colors that are a subset of Windows and Mac OS system colors. Choose System (Win) or System (Mac) to create a palette using the built‑in system color palette. This choice may cause unexpected results.

Select Interlace to display a slowly loaded image gradually by filling in missing lines. If this option is not select, an image looks fuzzy and gradually becomes clear as the image reaches full resolution.

Determines the trade-off between compression (for smaller file sizes) and image quality for each JPEG image created. Low produces the smallest file and lowest image quality.

Determines how quickly JPEG graphics display when the file containing the image is opened on the web. Choose Progressive to make the JPEG images display gradually and in increasing detail as they are downloaded. (Files created with this option are slightly larger and require more RAM for viewing.) Choose Baseline to make each JPEG file display only after it has been completely downloaded; a placeholder appears in its place until the file displays.

Digital Editions Contents options

The Contents section of the Digital Editions Export Options dialog box includes the following options.

Specify whether you want to use the XHTML or DTBook format.

Select this option if you want to generate a table of contents on the left side of the eBook. From the TOC Style menu, specify the TOC style you want to use in the eBook. You can choose Layout > Table Of Contents Styles to create a special TOC style for your eBook.

Select this option if you don’t want the document names to appear in the eBook table of contents. This option is especially useful when you’re creating an eBook from a book.

Select this options to split the ebook into multiple files, with each file beginning with the first level TOC entry. If a content file exceeds 260kb, a new chapter begins at the start of a paragraph between first level entries to help avoid the 300kb limit.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) are a collection of formatting rules that control the appearance of content in a web page. When you use CSS to format a page, you separate content from presentation.

When exporting to EPUB, you can create a list of CSS styles that can be edited.

If this option is selected, local formatting such as italic or bold is included.

Includes in the eBook all fonts that are allowed to be embedded. Fonts include embedding bits that determine whether the font is allowed to be embedded.

Selecting this option includes only undefined style names in the EPUB stylesheet.

Specify the URL of the existing CSS style sheet, which is usually a relative URL, such as “/styles/style.css.” InDesign does not check whether the CSS exists or is valid, so you’ll want to confirm your CSS setup.

Export content to Buzzword

Buzzword is a web-based text editor that lets users create and store text files on a web server. When you export a story to Buzzword, you create a text file on the Buzzword server.

The Buzzword document is opened on Acrobat.com. You can then move the document to a different workspace and share it with other people.

Use the web color swatch library

InDesign includes a color swatch library called Web, which consists of the colors most web browsers use to display text and graphics in web pages. The 216 colors in the library, often called web-safe colors, are consistent across platforms, because they are a subset of the colors that browsers use in both Windows and Mac OS. The web-safe colors in InDesign are the same as those in the Adobe Photoshop web-safe color palette and the Adobe Illustrator browser-safe color palette.

Each color in the library is named by its RGB values. Each color’s hexadecimal code, which HTML uses to define the color, is stored within the color swatch.

Do more with Adobe InDesign

Create and publish ebooks, brochures, flyers, postcards, posters, interactive page layouts, and more with Adobe InDesign.