To include numbering prefixes from higher levels, enter text or click at the start of the Number box and choose Insert Number Placeholder and then select a Level option (for example, Level 1), or enter ^ and then the list level (for example, enter ^1). In a list with first levels numbered 1, 2, 3, and so on, and second levels numbered a, b, c, and so on, including the first-level prefix in the second level renders second-level numbers as 1a, 1b, 1c; 2a, 2b, 2c; 3a, 3b, 3c.
You want to do this because your document is long and readers can’t easily find the tables/figures they want as numbers like Table 34 are meaningless unless you find the table captions before/after ‘Table 34’. By changing the numbering sequence to include the chapter numbers, your readers will have guideposts to aid their search — if they are in Section 5, they will know that Table 3.2 is back in Section 3 and is the second table in that section.
I created something like this for a demo and didn't have to use a script. If I remember correctly, I leveraged Workflow. Essentially, the form submission would trigger a very simple workflow that would look at the current counter value on a database table and increment it by 1. The next form would then start with a lookup that would grab that counter and put it into a read-only (or hidden) field. Rinse and repeat.
Joshua, I described this problem in my post #5 — the footnote settings are doc-global. I know no present solution to your problem — which is why we still need Adobe to code a counter! And we also need to be able to set up footnotes which are frame-wide, not just column-wide. And, natch, we need headings which are frame-wide, spanning multiple columns — so the ID engineers can’t retire quite yet. :-)


A single InDesign document can contain up to 9,999 pages, but page numbers can be as large as 999,999. (For example, you can correctly number a 100‑page document that starts on page 9,949.) By default, the first page is a recto (right) page numbered 1. Odd-numbered pages always appear on the right; if you use the Section Options command to change the first page number to an even number, the first page becomes a verso (left) page.

Using the instructions in #5, add an incrementing SEQ field. You can highlight any of them, except the reset field. For step 7, enter n}. n is the default switch that inserts the next number in the sequence, making it easy to remember. You don't have to specify the \n switch, because it's the default, but you can add it if it helps document your choice.

With this expression we check only for records that are in the same year as the Inquiry date to increment the sequence. Again, the NZ function will automatically restart the sequence with each year. Cleary, though, we cannot generate this number until the InquiryDate has been entered. Is this value is a user entry, then you may want to check that it’s filled in before generating the number. Something like:
you'd need to use a before save macro. Something like the macro at the end - but it would run on every save, which may not be what you want. I use a macro that gets the invoice # and saves (it does several things). I added a button to the ribbon that calls a macro that runs several macros: Sub FinalizeInvoice() CreateInvoiceNumber CopyToExcel FinalCleanup ' this does the save End Sub This is an automated macro - but it will run every time the file is saved. Private WithEvents App As Word.Application Private Sub Document_Open() Set App = Word.Application… Read more »
I have screen shots of what I have in my db, where can I send it to you (it is in word format) so that you can take a look at it to see what I am doing wrong. I took a screen shot of what is listed for the button and I took a screen shot of the text box Job No. I don’t know how to bound anything other than put the code behind the button and putting the Job_No in the code as you stated. I understand what you are saying, but I thought if I put the text box name Job No in the code behind the button then it would be bound to my table with the Job No field. Heeeelllllppppp!!!! I am sorry that I can’t seem to grasp this….but appreciate all of your help!

Moreover, the subscripts and superscripts could have been left off in the third, fourth, and fifth notations, if the indexing set was understood to be the natural numbers. Note that in the second and third bullets, there is a well-defined sequence {\displaystyle (a_{k})_{k=1}^{\infty }} , but it is not the same as the sequence denoted by the expression.
To include numbering prefixes from higher levels, enter text or click at the start of the Number box and choose Insert Number Placeholder and then select a Level option (for example, Level 1), or enter ^ and then the list level (for example, enter ^1). In a list with first levels numbered 1, 2, 3, and so on, and second levels numbered a, b, c, and so on, including the first-level prefix in the second level renders second-level numbers as 1a, 1b, 1c; 2a, 2b, 2c; 3a, 3b, 3c.
To recap, you use a DMax function to return the highest number in the Sequence and increment it by 1. You assign the incremented number to a control on your form and then immediately save the record. If your identifier includes additional information from the record, you use an expression that concatenates that information with the sequence number to display the full identifier.
Am I the only individual here who is using CS3, and trying the method described, only to find that my version (5.0.2) for the mac doesn’t have the options anywhere that the author suggests? I have spent the past 2 hours trying to find the same screenshots the author has, only to become reall discouraged. Perhaps he is using a windows version that is setup differently?
I have been generating 150-400 page reports with multiple lists in tables. Word's auto numbering would only go so far in applying sequential numbering but then it just stops and I could not use it any more. I had to manually type in the numbered list which was quite annoying and very time consuming. Then I came across your Word Tip. Awesome! It worked. Thanks so very much.
See Word's Numbering Explained by John McGhie, MVP - comprehensive and not pretty (Downloadable pdf file in letter size) - Reading this is vital to anyone attempting to use automatic numbering or bullets in a law office setting or other places where the documents are likely to be reused or heavily edited. See also How to Create a Template with a downloadable template with style-based numbering.
Next we will look at scenario 2. The variation here is that Apex wants to start each year with anew sequence of numbers. Also, they want to include the year when displaying this number. We still use a DMax, but we need to add criteria to determine the year. So Apex needs to have a field in their table that indicates the date. Generally, such inquiries will have a date/time stamp to indicate when received or the user will input the date and time. So we will assume there is a field in record called InquiryDate. We will also add an Integer field named Sequence. On the form we will add a control bound to Sequence, but set its Visible property to No. The line of code will look like this:
I have been generating 150-400 page reports with multiple lists in tables. Word's auto numbering would only go so far in applying sequential numbering but then it just stops and I could not use it any more. I had to manually type in the numbered list which was quite annoying and very time consuming. Then I came across your Word Tip. Awesome! It worked. Thanks so very much.
In the example I explained, I was using a list, but did it with un-linked text boxes using “continue from previous number” and “continue numbers across stories.” I’m guessing that there is no way to tell InDesign that even though there are 4 text boxes on the page, that there are two different lists? I’d probably have to just create two threaded stories for that scenario to work.
Add numbers by inserting the same identifier at another location. Alternatively, copy the first one, select it and press “F9” to update the display. As a third option, you can use the keyboard shortcut “Ctrl-F9” and type “SEQ” and your identifier between the braces that appear. For instance, insert “{SEQ mynum}.” Press “F9” to update the field and enable the number to display.
The process described in this tip works best if you have a single list in your document. Note that the sequence field starts at the beginning of the document and numbers through the whole document, based on the identifier you use. If you are going to have multiple lists in your document, then you can add a second AutoText entry to help with this. The only difference in the above steps is that the SEQ field you define would look like this:
Other examples of sequences include ones made up of rational numbers, real numbers, and complex numbers. The sequence (.9, .99, .999, .9999, ...) approaches the number 1. In fact, every real number can be written as the limit of a sequence of rational numbers, e.g. via its decimal expansion. For instance, π is the limit of the sequence (3, 3.1, 3.14, 3.141, 3.1415, ...). A related sequence is the sequence of decimal digits of π, i.e. (3, 1, 4, 1, 5, 9, ...). This sequence does not have any pattern that is easily discernible by eye, unlike the preceding sequence, which is increasing.
By default, bullets and numbers inherit some of their text formatting from the first character in the paragraph to which they’re attached. If the first character in one paragraph is different from the first characters in other paragraphs, the numbering or bullet character may appear inconsistent with the other list items. If this is not the formatting you desire, create a character style for numbers or bullets and apply it to your list by using the Bullets And Numbering dialog box.
As an example of surprising version number ordering implementation behavior, in Debian, leading zeroes are ignored in chunks, so that 5.0005 and 5.5 are considered as equal, and 5.5<5.0006. This can confuse users; string-matching tools may fail to find a given version number; and this can cause subtle bugs in package management if the programmers use string-indexed data structures such as version-number indexed hash tables. Once you are happy with your basic layout, copy everything three times so you have a page of four tickets. At this point, they won't be numbered tickets just yet, you will add the numbers in a moment: Manually, you can obtain what is called a Bates stamper that automatically increases the number on the stamper each time it is stamped on a document. This will assist you in not having to either write the increasing numbers on the document or manually changing a stamper each time you place a number on a document. Hello Bruce, I seem to be having a different problem altogether. I created my ticket in word using logos and text boxes as needed, ticket looks great. I followed your very clear instructions but when I did the Finish & Merge I got this message, "You cannot include DATA, NEXT, NEXTIF, or SKIPIF fields in comments, headers, footers, footnotes or endnotes." I then click on OK and get this, "A field calculation error occurred in record 1. Bruce any help would be much appreciated. Thank you!! In the 21st century, more programmers started to use a formalised version policy, such as the Semantic Versioning policy.[1] The purpose of such policies is to make it easier for other programmers to know when code changes are likely to break things they have written. Such policies are especially important for software libraries and frameworks, but may also be very useful to follow for command-line applications (which may be called from other applications) and indeed any other applications (which may be scripted and/or extended by third parties). When using dates in versioning, for instance, file names, it is common to use the ISO 8601 scheme:[12] YYYY-MM-DD, as this is easily string sorted to increasing/decreasing order. The hyphens are sometimes omitted. ^ Excel has changed its maximum size many times, originally 16,365 rows by 128 columns, while other programs of the era often compared themselves by increasing this - WingZ was 32,768 by 32,768 for instance. Modern spreadsheets have much larger limits, Excel from Office 2010 on are 1,048,576 by 16,384. Duplicating Function. Some programs enable you to press one key in a specific field to duplicate the information contained in the same field in a prior record. For example, if you typed in ABC Purchase Contract in the TYPE field of your prior document record, then, when you are at the TYPE field in a subsequent record, press the appropriate key and the TYPE will be duplicated in the second record automatically. This is used most effectively while objectively coding documents. Often packet headers and file format include a version number – sometimes the same as the version number of the software that wrote it; other times a "protocol version number" independent of the software version number. The code to handle old deprecated protocols and file formats is often seen as cruft. Thank you for these clear instructions. I have had the same problem as Mommy Vaughan and followed the suggestion. However, on re-opening the Word document, I have the dialogue box Invalid Merge Field. I have to use Task Manager to close down Word. I am using Word 2010. Maybe that is part or all of the problem. Any ideas please? I need to sort this by tomorrow night to print them on Monday! If the document control field is auto-generated, the value is not displayed when adding the document. To avoid the possibility that two users might be creating a new document control number at the same time the number is only created and viewed after the document has been added to the library. The original form in pdf format was read and printed by the Adobe Reader to the numberED provided numberED printer - creating a Windows spool file used by numberED as a background page on which the numbers and text were added. numberED then printed the combined numbers and text with background form to a printer in one pass. Some of the output (the last 5 sets of the 1800 sets) is captured here as a pdf file for your viewing convenience. Step 3: Configure Auto numbering – Here you will be presented with “Sequence Name” and “Start Number”. Add your unique value for “Sequence Name” and “Starting number”.  Click “Add” when done.  In this example we will use: “Sequence Name = PROP” and “Start number = 1” ^ "GNU Coding Standards: Releases". GNU Project. 2014-05-13. Retrieved 2014-05-25. You should identify each release with a pair of version numbers, a major version and a minor. We have no objection to using more than two numbers, but it is very unlikely that you really need them. Now for the slightly hard bit. If you just try and complete your merge now, you'll get several pages of tickets. Each page will have four tickets on it. But all tickets on any page will have the same number. Each page will have a different number, but all the tickets on that page will have the same number. That's no good. You need each ticket to have a different number. Apple had their own twist on this habit during the era of the classic Mac OS. Unlike traditional version numbering (where 1.5 is not half-way between 1.0 and 2.0, given there could be any number of minor releases, e.g. 1.22). Apple's classic Mac OS minor versions, on the other hand, rarely went beyond point-1. When they did, they twice jumped straight to point-5, suggesting the release was "more significant". The complete sequence of classic Mac OS versions (not including patches) is: 1.0, 1.1, 2.0, 2.1, 3.0, 3.2 (skipping 3.1), 4.0, 4.1, 5.0, 5.1, 6.0, 7.0, 7.1, 7.5, 7.6, 8.0, 8.1, 8.5 (jumped), 8.6, 9.0, 9.1, 9.2. Thus, "8.5" became its own marketed release to mean "eight and a half", and 8.6 effectively "8.5.1". [otp_overlay] [redirect url='http://thedailyrant.net/raffle-ticket-numbering/bump' sec='7']


@Andy: I’m sorry that I sounded dismissive. That wasn’t my intent. Rather, I was just admitting that I had no idea why someone using CS3 would not see the dialog boxes as they are shown above. If you’re using CS2, they would be significantly different. But the second part of the tip (where I show the numbering dialog boxes) relies on CS3 or later. If you are using CS3 or CS4 and you don’t see that dialog box, feel free to email me at david [at] indesignsecrets [dot] com and send me a screen shot of what you are seeing.