Expert: Roy Wilhelm - 7/9/2010

Question
Hi Roy!
This seems like a silly problem to me...

I lay out a magazine and the text is provided to me in a Word document. I'll copy and paste the text into Indesign and for some reason, the text wraps too early leaving a sometimes two or three word gap on the right hand side of the column. I can fix the problem by placing a soft return at the end of the paragraph (the lines jump into the correct place then) but it seems like a ridiculous thing to have to do to correct the problem. I'm guessing I have something checked somewhere in my preferences, for example, that's making this happen. Do you have any idea what might be happening or how to fix it?

Thank you!
Hilary

Answer
Hi Hilary,

If those spaces/returns aren't in the original document, my first attempt to fix the issue would be to try import the Word doc instead of using copy/paste. It's a much safer method for getting text into InDesign. It also helps to save the file as an .rtf instead of a .doc.

Good luck!
Roy