How do I correctly set a series of justified, bulleted paragraphs in indesign?
When I have a series of paragraphs beginning with bullets and a blank line in between them, I run into a typesetting problem. I cannot separate them with a non-breaking space, because that causes the last line of each paragraph to stretch across the page. So I have two options: set the paragraphs with an extra line’s worth of spacing after them, which is fine for me, but is going to cause problems if someone who doesn’t know too much about Indesign gets the file and can’t figure out what’s going on. The other option is to just leave the spaces and apply the bullet style to each paragraph individually, but that’s tedious. Is there a third way that beats either of my two?
9.Nov.2007 7.17am
You could easily solve this problem by inserting a “flush space” at the end of the line.
But I really don’t unterstand why you use a blank line in the first place? You should better try to achieve this with paragraph styles only.
9.Nov.2007 7.33am
James, couldn’t you just use the “Space Before” or “Space After” fields in the Paragraph palette, rather than having that extra blank line after each paragraph?
9.Nov.2007 10.41am
funny, this was in the fonts.com newsletter just this week:
http://www.fonts.com/AboutFonts/Articles/FineTypography/BulletedLists.ht...
9.Nov.2007 10.56am
But I really don’t unterstand why you use a blank line in the first place? You should better try to achieve this with paragraph styles only.
If I worked alone, I would.
9.Nov.2007 10.58am
I think you’ve hit on the fundamental problem with producing very “clean” ID files. For an experienced users, having most of the design relegated to styles can be a godsend, both for time and spec’s sake. But for Johnny Wordperfect, even soft returns (which clean files often dispense with in favor of space after, wrap-around, indent-to-here, etc.) can be a source of confusion.
If that isn’t that huge a concern, though, Ricardo’s approach is certainly the best.
9.Nov.2007 11.15am
>>If I worked alone, I would.
Well, if paragraph styles or the flush space character are too complicated for your co-workers, I guess the best solution would be not to use justified text … ;-)
Ralf