running text through different table cells

[EdwardMartinIII]

I noticed when I overflow text in a table cell, I get a red dot instead of a jump tag.

The red dot doesn't seem to respond to the usual "Here, let me tell you where the rest goes" commands.

CAN one jump text from one cell to a different cell in a table?



Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door

 

[EdwardMartinIII]

D'oh!

Well, looks like it's not possible:

http://livedocs.adobe.com/en_US/InD...Sa285fff53dea4f8617383751001ea8cb3f-6fca.html

Poot.

Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door

 

[eugenetyson]

Edward, what you need to do is look at the Control Panel at the top of the page, the panel below, File, Edit Layout etc.

When you have a cell selected in your table have a look for something that says, "Exactly" change this to at "At least" then reduce the size. This means that the table will be at least the size you specify and won't go under the size, but it will also increase if there is more text. Having it set at exactly will give you an overflow box.

If you want the text to run on into another cell, it's not possible, for various reason, but all you have to do is Merge that cell with the one below it. Technically you should be keeping all the text relevant to a cell in one cell anyway.

Think about it.

 

[EdwardMartinIII]

Yeah, flowing into the cell below is just like merging the cells. I was thinking of flowing into cells OTHER than the expected cell. Like flowing up and to a side, seemingly random tracking of various threads.

Without having the table bulge and warp all over.

So, the solution to my thing is to write the text in a text window elsewhere, and then piece-by-piece paste it into the cells I want.

Which is what I kinda figured after reading the Adobe doc.

Another brutal strike against Impossibly Bad Design. 8)

Thanks!


Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door

 

[eugenetyson]

Well you could just put the tabs in the appropriate place in your text.

Then put in paragraph returns.

Tabs represent columns, paragraph returns represent rows.

If you have the same about of rows and columns in the table as you do in the text, then you can copy and paste all the text in one swift move.

Or you could convert that text to a table. Copying and pasting bit by bit seems tedious and unnecssary.

 

[EdwardMartinIII]

Copying and pasting bit by bit seems tedious and unnecssary."

I'm sorry, I totally sucked at explaining the idea.

Think of a checkerboard. Only black and white squares. But instead of only two colors, imagine a seemingly random spread of, say, eight colors, each color has eight squares to itself.

Each color is a text thread, a story that jumps around (not "story" as in InDesign, but just think story as in tale).

A person reading traditionally, from left-to-right by cells, will read all sixty-four pieces as a single tale. A person following the colored threads will read eight DIFFERENT tales.

The order of each colored thread will be determined by a number behind the text. So, for example, if you're looking at the blue "5" square, you need to find the "4" square first.

D'oh!

Oh man, I am dumb as a box of hair! I don't NEED a table for the text -- I can do it entirely with text boxes, all jiggered properly and placed properly on the page! The numbers can be put in text boxes as well, properly sized, placed, and ordered behind the primary text.

I can format the text boxes and flow text into the "1" square and it'll go sequentially however I placed the boxes. D'oh! D'oh!

* smacking my head with my desk now... *

Thanks for leading me to the right place!


Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door

 

[eugenetyson]

I just dropped the breadcrumbs, you followed them.

You should use object styles for your text boxes too, that will speed things up for you.

 

[EdwardMartinIII]

You should use object styles for your text boxes too, that will speed things up for you."

Yep, yep, yep!

Edward

"Cut a hole in the door. Hang a flap. Criminy, why didn't I think of this earlier?!" -- inventor of the cat door