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About data source files

The data source typically originates from a spreadsheet or database application, but you can create your own data source file using InDesign or any text editor. Data source files should be saved in a comma-delimited (.csv) or tab-delimited (.txt) text format. Check your source application’s user guide for more information on exporting to these formats.

In a comma- or tab-delimited text file, records are separated by paragraph breaks; fields are separated by commas or tabs. The data source file can also include text or paths that refer to images on disk.

Example of comma-delimited data source file

Name,Company Name,State
Bill Tucker,CoreVent Labs,Nevada
Dat Nguyen,"Brady, Hunt, and Baxter, Inc",Delaware
Maria Ruiz,"Brinquist Enterprises, Inc.",California
If you want to include a comma or quotation mark in a comma-delimited file, enclose the text within quotation marks, such as “Brady, Hunt, and Baxter, Inc.”. If you do not include the quotation marks, each name is treated as a separate field.

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Comments


workhorse_intl said on Dec 8, 2007 at 5:34 AM :
ADDITION

If it is possible to include "newline" (or "</b>") characters in a text field, mention of that capability (or the lack of it) on this page would be useful. If it does exist, links to where the description of that capbility resides would be useful. If it does not exist, mentioning it here would stop me from spending time searching for it elsewhere in the documentation.

Alternatively, if the only way to embed "newline" is through the XML merge capability, mentioning it here and linking to the root of the XML merge option discussion would be very useful.
Bob - Adobe Writer said on Dec 10, 2007 at 8:25 AM :
Good point. Unfortunately, I don't know of a way to add a newline (end-of-line) character to a data merge field. I'll do some research to come up with alternatives.
No screen name said on Jan 15, 2008 at 11:10 AM :
To add and end-of-line to data (equivalent of shift + enter key), you need to enter &#8232;
No screen name said on May 4, 2008 at 9:19 AM :
I couldn't find a way to import Unicode files (containing Latin-1 and
Japanese characters). It just refuses to load such files.

What is strange is that if one tries to load (on a Mac) a source file encoded in
Mac OS Roman, checking the tick box "Import options" one will get asked
whether the file is Unicode or not.
macsavers said on Jul 16, 2008 at 11:20 AM :
This feature works great if you don't have paragraph breaks in your data. But
if you add just one paragraph break, irregardless of it being within the
quotes of a comma-separated document, it will NOT handle the data
properly. This one problem completely derailed a project intended for
InDesign and cost us over 3k to resolve by another means.
Bob - Adobe Writer said on Jul 16, 2008 at 12:27 PM :
Instead of adding paragraph breaks in data fields, create two separate fields, such as Address1 and Address2. If individual records don't have an Address2 field, you can have InDesign delete the blank space automatically. I know that's easier said than done with certain data sources, but you'll get much better results with InDesign's data merge feature.
No screen name said on Oct 6, 2008 at 11:46 AM :
Save your spreadsheet as a UTF-16 text file to merge Japanese characters.

 

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