Improve the reading experience of your PDF files by adding bookmarks and a table of contents. Learn to use the Table of Contents feature in InDesign to generate both bookmarks and hyperlinks that will help your readers quickly find information in your PDF files.
It all starts with Paragraph Styles
While speaking at Adobe MAX conferences, I’ve often referred to InDesign as “the most stylin’ app in the Creative Cloud.” Styles in InDesign range from paragraph and character styles for text to objects and graphic frames — and can also include tables and table cells, anchored objects, GREP statements, nested styles, hyperlinks — and the list goes on.
Paragraph Styles, however, are key for the Table of Contents (TOC) feature. Typically, styles used for headings work best for a TOC. To create a Paragraph Style, begin by opening the Paragraph Styles panel from the Window > Styles menu. Next, select the characters of your headline within your layout. With the text still selected, click the “create new style” icon in the bottom-right of the Paragraph Style panel. This will create a style based on the properties of the text you had selected.
Contents and chose Custom/Create Table of Contents. I did not use the Tables of Contents samples from the Table of Contents Gallery as this creates a Table of Contents using Content Controls which are still inaccessible. The end point is that I even created the most accessible Table of Contents I could. Any cosmetic changes to the default Table. Adobe Acrobat Pro Create Table Of Contents Well, you could always buy a copy of Adobe Acrobat, which is actually designed solely for the purpose of creating and editing PDF files. Or you could import the file into Calibre, convert it to ePub format, edit the ePub to add the table of contents, then convert it back to.
Import TOC styles from another document. Choose Layout Table Of Contents Styles. Click Load, select the InDesign file containing the TOC styles you want to copy, and then click Open.
To rename your style, or make style changes, double-click the new paragraph style in the list to open the style options dialog box. Once you finish editing your style, assign the style to your headline by selecting the characters of your headline, then selecting the paragraph style from the list of styles in your Paragraph Styles panel.
Advanced tip If you hold the Option key (Mac) or the Alt key (Windows) when clicking the create new style icon, the properties dialog box will immediately open from the Paragraph Styles panel, allowing you to edit the new style right away.
Throughout your InDesign document, be sure to apply the Paragraph Style to all of the headings. Not only will this allow you to make design changes faster, but it will also help us add bookmarks and interactivity within a PDF file.
Creating a table of contents
The Table of Contents feature gathers the contents and page numbers of specific paragraph styles in order to provide a list of the contents included in your publication. This content is created automatically and can be updated as your document is edited. While this provides very useful textual information in regard to finding content, this same information can also be used to make your document interactive when exporting to PDF.
To begin to create a TOC, find a location in your document where you’d like the TOC to appear. Next, select Table of Contents from the Layout menu. We’ll be setting a few properties within this dialog box, starting with setting the title to simply “contents.” In the Styles in Table of Contents section, we’ll choose the paragraph style for our heading and click the add button.
The Options section of the Table of Contents dialog box includes the Create PDF Bookmarks option. Checking this option will result in a PDF file that includes bookmarks that link directly to the corresponding content within the document. This feature also results in a more structured and searchable PDF file. Bonus!
When finished, click OK to return to your document with a loaded text cursor. Click to add a new story into your document that includes all of the TOC information.
Updating the table of contents
Because the TOC is automatically generated, making changes involves revisiting the Table of Contents dialog box. To do this, select the TOC text frame in your layout, then choose Table of Contents from the Layout menu.
Continue to make edits in this dialog box, including changes to the title, included paragraph styles, and various options, then click OK. The selected text frame will update with your new settings. You can update the Table of Contents as often as you like.
After you have finished designing your document, you’ll want to update the TOC entries and page numbers. Just as we did before, select the TOC text frame, then choose Update Table of Contents from the Layout menu. This will refresh the content of the TOC based on all of the settings we defined earlier.
Exporting an interactive PDF
Now that we have added a TOC to our document, we’ll need to make sure we check the options for Bookmarks and Hyperlinks in the PDF export dialog box. InDesign provides a few ways to export a PDF file.
If you have created PDF presets in any Creative Cloud application, they will be available in the File > Adobe PDF Presets menu. You can also use one of two pre-defined format presets located in the File > Export menu. These presets are named Adobe PDF (print) and Adobe PDF (interactive).
In the Export Adobe PDF dialog box, be sure to check the options for Bookmarks and Hyperlinks. These options are automatically checked when choosing the Adobe PDF (interactive) option. The resulting PDF file will now contain a hyperlinked TOC as well as a corresponding bookmark for each TOC entry.
Watch these features in action
Join Chris Converse in the recorded webinar and learn how features such as table of contents, hyperlinks, nested styles, and nested master pages to create a user-friendly interactive PDF for desktop computers and mobile devices.
In this session you’ll learn to:
Create paragraph and character styles.
Define and update a table of contents for your document.
Design documents for better usability.
Use advanced styles for greater control.
Add interactive content such as hyperlinks.
Adobe Creative Cloud e-learning series:
Generate a table of contents or list
Before you generate a table of contents or other paragraph list, do the following to avoid problems in generated lists:
•Make sure that tags and elements are applied correctly and consistently. For example, use Heading1 for all first-level headings only.
•Make each item you want to include in the list a single paragraph. For example, you won’t get the desired results if a heading is two lines, with each line in a separate paragraph.
•Validate structured documents to make sure that they do not have structure errors.
note:You usually generate a list of references—such as a list of fonts or unresolved cross-references—for your own use while working with a document. You do not need to prepare the document before generating such a list.
Generate a table of contents or list for a book
1)Open the book window and select the file below where you want the generated file to appear.
2)Do one of the following:
•Choose Add > Create Standalone TOC
•Choose Add > List of, and then choose a type of list from the menu
The items you see in the dialog box depend on the type of list you’re generating.
3)Enter a suffix or keep the default one. The suffix indicates the type of generated file. For example, TOC is the usual suffix for a table of contents.
note:The suffix is not the same as the filename’s extension. The suffix is used with paragraph tags in the generated lists, and appears as part of the generated file’s filename, such as UserGuideTOC.fm.
4)In the set up dialog box, Add File drop-down list, specify whether the generated list will appear before or after the current document.
5)Move items to the Include scroll list. To move an item between scroll lists, select the item and click an arrow, or double-click the item. To move all items from one scroll list to the other, Shift-click an arrow.
6)To have each entry in the generated list be linked to its source, select Create Hypertext Links. These links let you jump to the source of an entry by clicking the entry.
7)Click OK and then click Update. FrameMaker generates the list. You can view the generated list by double-clicking its name in the book window.
8)Save the generated list in the same folder as the source document or book. If you want to rename the generated file, use the book window to do so—FrameMaker will rename it on the disk and update all references.
The first time you generate a list (if you don’t use a template), the list uses the page layout (master pages) of the first non-generated document in the book, and all entries look the same.
If the list already exists in the source document’s folder when you save it, save it in the same folder and don’t change the filename. That way, the list’s formatting is used when you generate the list again. Otherwise, formatting changes won’t be retained when you update the list.
How To Create Table Of Contents Pdf
tip:To use a template or an existing generated file in a new book file, add it to the book as a generated file. Then put the existing file in the folder that contains the book file, using the name that appears in the book window.
9)Save any open files in the book. Open files are updated only in your computer’s memory and not on the disk. If a file isn’t open, the changes are made on the disk.
Related links:
Generate a table of contents or list for a single document
1)Open the document wherein you want to insert the TOC or list.
2)In the document window, do one of the following:
•Choose Special > Table of Contents > Create Standalone TOC
•Choose Special > List of, and then choose a type of list from the menu
3)When prompted, specify whether you want to create the generated file as a standalone document or add it to a book.
If you choose Yes to create a standalone document, FrameMaker will create a generated list in the original document’s folder. If you choose No, FrameMaker adds the generated file to an open book, or creates a new book if necessary.
Acrobat Table Of Contents
4)The set up dialog box for the TOC or the chosen list is displayed. Specify the following details in the dialog box:
Set up Table of Contents dialog box
•Enter a suffix or keep the default one. The suffix indicates the type of generated file. For example, TOC is the usual suffix for a table of contents.
note:The suffix is not the same as the filename’s extension. The suffix is used with paragraph tags in the generated lists, and appears as part of the generated file’s filename, such as Chapter1TOC.fm.
•Move paragraph tags, marker types, or reference types to the Include scroll list. To move an item between scroll lists, select the item and click an arrow, or double-click the item. To move all items from one scroll list to the other, Shift-click an arrow.
Create Table Of Contents In Adobe Acrobat Pro
•To have each entry in the generated list be linked to its source, select Create Hypertext Links. These links let you jump to the source of an entry by clicking the entry.
5)Depending on your selection in Step 3, do one of the following:
•If you are creating a standalone list (when the choice is Yes in Step 3), click OK. FrameMaker generates and displays the list.
•If you are adding the list to a book (when the choice is No in Step 3), click OK, and then click Update. If a new book is created, choose File > Save Book As, and then save the book.
6)Save the generated list in the same folder as the source document or book.
The first time you generate a list (if you don’t use a template), the list uses the page layout (master pages) of the source document or of the first non-generated document in the book, and all entries look the same. For information on changing the format of a list—changes that won’t be lost when you regenerate the list.
7)Save the list in the same folder as the source document or book.
Related links:
Generating TOCs and other lists in structured documents
Although the steps for generating TOCs and lists in structured documents are the same as for unstructured documents, consider the following additional points:
•A generated list is initially unstructured, but you can add structure to it. If a generated list is structured, you’ll lose the structure every time you regenerate it. Do not add structure to a list until it is in its final version.
•The items in the scroll lists vary depending on the type of list you’re gathering. For example, the element and paragraph tags in the source document appear for a table of contents. (Paragraph tags appear after element tags and are preceded by a paragraph symbol .) For a list of references, the available reference types appear.
•Some element tags may have context labels that provide information about the element’s location in the structure. For example, if Section elements can be nested within other Section elements, context labels might identify whether the elements are first-, second-, or third-level sections.
Context labels
•If an element uses context labels, a <no label> entry also appears in the scroll list for occurrences not described by the labels. In the example above, Section (<no label>) represents Section elements that are at a fourth level or lower in the document.
•If an element has more than one paragraph, only text from the first paragraph will appear in the generated list. For example, the first paragraph within a Section element—usually its Head—will appear.
•The first time you generate a list (if you don’t use a template), it uses the page layout (master pages) of the first non-generated document in the book, and all entries look the same. The list also has element definitions from the source document.
Related links:
Add a title or other static text to lists and indexes
If you want to add a title or other unchanging text in your list or index, add it after you generate the list or index the first time.
You can also add static text to a template and then use the template to format a list or index.
1)Type the title before the first entry on a body page.
2)Use the Paragraph Catalog to give the text a special paragraph format for static text; or create a new paragraph format for the title.
3)If you create a new paragraph tag, make sure it does not end with the suffix assigned when you created the generated file, such as IX for a standard index or TOC for a table of contents. When you generate the index again, FrameMaker replaces only the paragraphs that have tags ending with the suffix.