Converting many MS-Word Docs to InDesign - need advice

[labpaq]

We have hundreds of MS-Word docs to convert to InDesign (ID). If anyone out there has experience doing this – which of the following approaches would you recommend:

1 – Place the formatted Word files directly into the ID document file – and then clean up and standardize the styles and delete the MS-Word styles that were imported from placing the Word docs.

2 – Or, first convert the MS-Word files to plain text (without formatting), import the unformatted text docs into ID and then go thru and apply all the proper formatting – place the pictures - re-do the tables, etc.

I did a test with one document using the Place command - it came into ID fairly clean and my preference would be for #1 above so that we do not have to re-do tables, replace pictures, and re-format all of the text etc. However, I do not know what issues may arise down the road if the Word doc styles are imported into ID in option #1.

 

[spamjim]

or...

3 - use the import options in the place file dialog for more control.

If you are trying to retain existing content and style, what benefit is there from converting to a common DOC format to a less popular INDD format?

 

[labpaq]

As far as your question “If you are trying to retain existing content and style, what benefit is there from converting to a common DOC format to a less popular INDD format? “

Good Question --- We currently have hundreds of Word Docs that are essentially chapters in our manuals or books (hundreds of those as well), where any one chapter\DOC file could be in many different books. When we update the base DOC file (which happens often) we only want to do it in one place in the DOC file, and have it automatically updated in all of the books that include this DOC file.

To accomplish this we currently use an obscure Word feature – Word Master Files, which have links to included DOC files, but do not include the DOC files themselves. We have to publish our completed manuals to traditional PDF files and also in an internet ready format for various Learning Management Systems.

On the PDF publication side we currently have a multistep process: 1) many DOC files may be linked to 2) several Word Master DOC files – 3) the Word Master files (expanded versions) are then 4) copied to a standard Word Doc file for our books\manuals, and then finally the expanded DOC files are 5) output to Adobe PDF files.

The current problems include first, the multi-step translations are somewhat manual now and labor intensive, and second: with the several translations that happen in these 4 steps, formatting errors and glitches can and do occur.

InDesign has a nice Book feature which does this for us, and at the same time easily exports to a PDF file. So our main incentive is getting rid of all of the quirky issues that come up when we use Word.

Of course we are not entirely sure what we are getting into here since we are very green as far as the Adobe Creative Suite and InDesign – so perhaps you see something that we are missing?

 

[spamjim]

I am no expert in Word but I thought that you could bind multiple DOC files. A genius in the Word/Office forum might help.

My only concern was that there might be a way to do this exclusively in Word before adding another level of complexity with ID.

And generation of PDF from Word should not be an obstacle. Adobe Acrobat offers a Word add-in to do this or you can print to PDF with a free virtual printer like CutePDF.