Welcome
Welcome to Michèle’s CrossReferences plugin, designed to transform HTML-like cross-reference tags into InDesign cross-references.
Return to plugins section. Return to the InDesign Automation page. Return to the Home page.
For information on other plugins please go to my InDesign Automation page plugins section.
General information
Plugin name: CrossReferences
Version: 1.0.0 – 8/18/26
Fee: US$99.99 – includes minor updates until major version release
Availability: Adobe Marketplace
Status: Not yet published
Source code in book: Adobe InDesign Automation of Nonfiction Books via JavaScript
Requirements
The CrossReferences plugin is restricted to documents which implement a tags-based cross-reference scheme. Namely tags such as <seex>chapter or section header</see>. The algorithm requires five paragraph styles: DSL – HDG0 no number and four more numbered HDG0, HDG1… Settings follow:
- Unnumbered paragraph style named DSL – HDG0 no number defines new unnumbered paragraphs.
Its basic character formats size should be set to 26 or whatever.
Its Bullets and Numbering List Type should be set to None, Level and Character Style are grayed out.
Its Keep Options Start Paragraph should be set to Next Odd Page. - Numbered paragraph style named DSL – HDG0 defines new numbered paragraphs.
Its basic character formats size should be set to 0.1. Its
Its Bullets and Numbering Character Style should be set to DSL – CHAR HDG0; see below.
Its Bullets and Numbering List Type should be set to Numbers, Level set to 1.
Its Keep Options Start Paragraph should be set to Next Odd Page. - Numbered paragraph style named DSL – HDG1, HDG1… define sections.
Its basic character formats size should be set to 0.1. Its
Its Bullets and Numbering Character Style should be set to DSL – CHAR HDG0; see below.
Its Bullets and Numbering List Type should be set to Numbers, Level set to 2, 3, and 4 respectively.
Its Keep Options Start Paragraph should be set to Anywhere.
The x in <seex> is limited to two numbers, 2 and 9. These refer to indexes in the Paragraph style formats array.
What it does
As the author, Julia, who writes cooking books, inserts content into her desserts manuscript, she will, on occasion, want to redirect her reader to some other part of the book. For example, as she writes on preparing a cinnamon apple pie, she may want to redirect her reader to a section of the book which explains the pros and cons of several types of dough, as follows:
See Dough types – pros and cons page 77
She can do this by inserting in her text a cross-reference tag as follows:
You may want to select one of the dough types as explained in <see2>Dough types – pros and cons</see>. IMHO, the best choice would be All-Butter Pie Dough.
The <see2>…</see> tag above contains the target (chapter or section name) and the index into the InDesign cross-reference formats (2 in <see2>). All the author needs to do to cross-reference the reader to some other part of the book is to insert appropriate <seex> tags.
To display cross-reference formats available, open the InDesign Cross-reference Pane and click on the little hamburger icon in the top left of the pane and choose Define Cross-Reference Formats… You will see a list. You will find details on creating your own formats in my book on automating InDesign.
Important: the underlying concept is that a cross-reference should target a chapter or section header. It is consequently important that the <seex> tag’s content be rigorously identical to a chapter or section header, case- and spaces-wise.
Please note that a dialog box displays the HOMEDIR full path to enable the plugin user find the IndexesReadme.txt file.
For more information
You will find source code in my InDesign automation book so that you could roll your own ImageProcessing plugin.
For information on other plugins please go back to my InDesign Automation page plugins section.
Return to the InDesign automation page.