Adobe InDesign CS3 - Manual (Page 530)

INDESIGN CS3
User Guide
523
3 Choose File > Import XML (or choose Import XML on the Structure pane menu) and then select the XML file
you want to import.
4 Select Show XML Import Options.
5 Select Merge Content, and then click OK.
6 To link the XML content to the original XML file, select Create Link.
InDesign will list the XML file in the Links panel and display a yellow alert triangle in the panel if the XML source
file changes.
7 Select additional import options as needed:
Clone Repeating Text Elements If you are importing repeating XML, clones a single placeholder element to create a
container for each record in the file.
Only Import Elements That Match Existing Structure Filters the incoming XML, so that elements that do not exist in
the Structure pane are not imported.
Do Not Import Contents Of Whitespace-Only Elements Preserves any spacing or static text inserted between
elements in a placeholder frame.
Delete Elements, Frames, And Content That Do Not Match Imported XML After XML has been imported, deletes any
elements or placeholders in your document that were not matched (or replaced) by incoming data.
8 Click OK.
InDesign merges content into the document starting with the first matching element in the XML file.
XML Import options
When importing and placing XML data using the Merge Content option, the XML Import Options dialog box offers
the following options:
Create Link Links to the XML file so that if the XML file is updated, you can update its XML data in your InDesign
document.
Apply XSLT Applies a stylesheet to define the transformation of the imported XML. Select Browse (Windows) or
Choose (Mac OS) to select an XSLT file (.xsl or .xslt) from the file system. Use Stylesheet From XML, the default
option, causes InDesign to use an XSLT processing instruction, if one is present in the XML file, to transform the
XML data.
Clone Repeating Text Elements Replicates the formatting applied to tagged placeholder text for repeating content.
Create one formatting instance (for example, an address), and then reuse its layout to create other instances automat-
ically. (See “Working with repeating data” on page 518.)
Only Import Elements That Match Existing Structure Filters the imported XML content so that only elements from
the imported XML file with matching elements in the document are imported.
Import Text Elements Into Tables If Tags Match Imports elements into a table if the tags match the tags applied to the
placeholder table and its cells. For example, use this option to place database records into a table when generating
price lists or inventory sheets.
Do Not Import Contents Of Whitespace-only Elements Leaves any existing content in place if the matching XML
content contains only whitespace (such as a return or tab character). Use this option if you’ve included text between
elements in your placeholder frames and you want to preserve this text. For example, when laying out recipes
generated from a database, you might add labels such as “Ingredients” or “Instructions.” As long as the parent
element that wraps each recipe contains only whitespace, InDesign leaves the label in place.