Datasheet

Understanding Global and Local Control

The power of desktop publishing in general and InDesign in particular, is that it lets you automate

time-consuming layout and typesetting tasks while letting you customize each step of the process

according to your needs. This duality of structure and flexibility — implemented via the dual use

of the frame-based and free-form layout metaphors — carries over to all operations, from typogra-

phy to color. You can use global controls to establish general settings for layout elements and then

use local controls to modify those elements to meet specific publishing requirements. The key to

using global and local tools effectively is to know when each is appropriate.

Global tools include:

General preferences and application preferences (see Chapter 3)

Master pages (see Chapter 7)

Text styles (see Chapter 20)

Table and cell styles (see Chapter 22)

Object styles (see Chapter 13)

Stroke styles (see Chapter 12)

Welcome to InDesign

Part I

continued

Lighting effects: This set of features lets you give dimensional effects to text through the

use of custom drop shadows and other effects. (See Chapter 12.)

Transparency: This lets you make objects fade to create special effects as they overlap or

for ghost-like visuals. (See Chapter 12.)

Automated spell-checking and text correction: This is similar to Microsoft Word’s nonin-

vasive correction tools. (See Chapter 16.)

InDesign also includes a few features that aren’t new in desktop publishing history but have not been

available to mainstream programs for many years:

Object styles: This lets you apply a range of attributes, such as fill and stroke, to an object

and reuse those same settings on other objects. (See Chapter 13.)

Table and cell styles: These let you apply consistent formatting to entire tables or to indi-

vidual cells, as well as reuse those settings in other tables and cells. (See Chapter 22.)

Text variables: This feature lets you have InDesign automatically insert and keep updated

information such as chapter numbers, filenames, creation dates, and anything you choose

to define as a variable. (See Chapter 23.)

Footnotes: This is similar to how word processors handle this annotation method. (See

Chapter 24.)

Follow-me anchored objects: This lets you keep items such as figures and sidebars with

text as it flows throughout a document. (See Chapter 12.)

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