I've struggled long enough with my Index ...

[re3ver]

Can someone please tell me what I'm doing wrong? I am trying to set up a two-column index that looks like the sample index (right-justified page numbers). However, I'm getting the following:

IndexCapture.jpg

I thought it had something to do with the "float" attribute for the Index styles, but Flare seems to ignore all of my attempts to change them.

Help?? Thank you.

[bobmoon]

There is a long but VERY informative post about formatting the index here.

Maybe it will clear some things up for you. I assume you're generating PDF? Flare seems to generate a decent looking index in Word.

Bob

[re3ver]

Thanks Bob, but I'm still stuck. I do not have MadCap Blaze, which seems to be one of his main tools in his quest for solutions. I'll keep looking.

[garyjgeoaccess]

The thread that bobmoon referred to isn't about Blaze. The thread discusses how the MadCapBlaze.css file is used by Flare. This is a Flare file.

Maybe this file appears in Blaze also, but regardless of whether you have Blaze, you have a file called MadCapBlaze.css--and it's used by your index.

From my experience, you'll likely have alignment problems in your index unless you make some customizations to MadCapBlaze.css.

[re3ver]

Huh .. OK .. I misunderstood. I saw that he referenced a temporary file, but I have to admit I couldn't find it. Can you tell me where I'll find this .css file? Sorry to be obtuse.

[re3ver]

Never mind. I found it. Thanks.

[garyjgeoaccess]

Each line in the index is generated in a separate table. The right column contains the page number. To get this cell to consistently right align the page number, you'll want to look at the MadCapBlaze.css file that is generated during a build. It's located in the Resources\Stylesheets folder of your output. Open up this file in a text editor and look for these two styles:

td.GenIndexPageText1
and
td.GenIndexPageText2

These styles are for the page numbers in the index. Once you know what styles are being written to MadCapBlaze.css (this happens on the fly with each build), you can then plan to change those values by altering your topic stylesheet OR by altering the version of MadCapBlaze.css that exists in your installation of Flare.

If you get this far and want to know more, let me know and I'll give you the rest of the instructions, otherwise I'll assume I've lost you already. (Nothing against you. MadCap's coding for indexes is problematic.)

[re3ver]

Hey,

I'm that far and am looking at the two td.GenIndexText styles. Do I set "text-align" to right? And then, once I've done that, does the miracle occur? Thanks for your time. This is, as you say, problematic.

[garyjgeoaccess]

I wish it were that simple ...

Do these styles say "text-align: left"? If so, follow these instructions:

You can't set "text-align: right" in your output version of MadCapBlaze.css because this file gets overwritten every time you do output.

You need to tweak BOTH your topic stylesheet AND your installed version of MadCapBlaze.css.

First, grab the styles for td.GenIndexText1 and td.GenIndexText2 from the output version of the MadCapBlaze.css file and copy 'em to the print/PDF section of your topic stylesheet. Then tweak the styles so they have the attributes that you want, including "text-align: right".

Next, you need to prevent Flare from overwriting your topic stylesheet values for these styles. As is, Flare will write values for these styles to the output version of MadCapBlaze.css and these values will overwrite your topic stylesheet. However, if you include EMPTY styles for td.GenIndexText1 and td.GenIndexText2 in your INSTALLED version of MadCapBlaze.css, you can prevent Flare from writing values for these styles to the output version of MadCapBlaze.css.

The installed version of MadCapBlaze.css is located here "Program files\MadCap Software\MadCap Flare V4\Flare.app\Resources\BlazeTargetCompiler". Open this file in a text editor. By default, it's empty.

Add these lines to your file:

td.GenIndexPageText1
{
}

td.GenIndexPageText2
{
}

These styles are empty, but because you've declared these styles in your installed version of MadCapBlaze.css, you will have prevented Flare from writing new values for these styles to the output version of MadCapBlaze.css.

Is that clear as mud?

Your index should now have right aligned page numbers.

[garyjgeoaccess]

I should add this qualifier ...

By changing your installed version of MadCapBlaze.css, this change will affect ALL indexes generated with your installation of Flare. This might be okay. It might not. You need to make the call.

[re3ver]

The amazing thing is that anyone could figure out how to solve this issue. Thank you SO much. I will apply these changes now and report back.

[re3ver]

I can't tell you how badly I wanted this to work. However, something has gone seriously wrong. I believe I followed your instructions, but I'm perfectly willing to believe that I have mucked it up. Here is what I did:

1. To my installed MadCapBlaze.css (the one in the Programs folder) I added:

td.GenIndexPageText1
{
}

td.GenIndexPageText2
{
}

2. I copied the Output version of MadCapBlaze.css into the Print section of my project .css; and I changed text-align to right.

3. I compiled.

Here is how the index looks now:

IndexCapture2.jpg

Additionally, the entries for these two tags have been overwritten in the Output version of the MadCapBlaze.css (they were written to the top of the file, and they were removed from where I had added them). The two tags are now completely missing from the project .css.

Sorry to ask again, but .. help?

[garyjgeoaccess]

The two tags are now completely missing from the project .css.

Are you referring to the output version of your project stylesheet? Yes, Flare mucks with this version, but the styles for the page numbers would still be in there--unless the styles never made it into your project/topic stylesheet (the one stored in Content\Resources\Stylesheets NOT the one in Output\...\Resources\Stylesheets). Double check.

I think you may have edited the wrong version of your project/topic stylesheet. Don't edit any of the files in the Output folders.

[re3ver]

Thanks so much for all of your help. I continued to struggle with the appearance of the index. Periodically, I pulled in backed-up versions of various .css files; but nothing seemed to work. I obviously had a rogue setting in one of the style sheets.

Today, I left the installed MadCapBlaze.css with its empty tags, and I replaced all of the other .css files. Lo and behold, it has right-justified numbers! However, they look like this:

indexcapture3.jpg

Not sure why the numbers are as huge as they are ... ideas?

Also, is there an easy way to remove the ruler that Flare displays beneath the Contents and Index titles (and on every following page)?

Thanks again.

[garyjgeoaccess]

Flare has attached a top border to the index proxy (as well as the TOC proxy). This creates the horizontal line.

Here is how to eliminate the border on the index. Add the following style to your topic stylesheet:

MadCap|indexProxy
{
border-top: none;
}

and you set the font size and other attributes for the page numbers with td.GenIndexText1 and td.GenIndexText2. Same drill as before. Put these styles in your topic stylesheet.

I hope that helps.

[doc_guy]

This isn't directly relevant, but I'll add it for others who may be building indexes: there is a known bug in Flare 4 where you cannot build a PDF to a network drive and have the index build properly. You must build the PDF file to your local machine to get the index to build properly.

So if you are creating an index and you notice that there are weird page breaks or index entries missing page numbers, check to make sure you are building the PDF file locally.

Like I said, not directly relevant to this thread, but still interesting information.

[garyjgeoaccess]

Thanks, Paul.

Valuable info.