PALETTES

InDesign CS has introduced a new concept for the floating palettes most software uses for specifying design, formatting and drawing options.

At the right side of your work space you’ll see several palettes with tabs in each. To activate a particular pane, click on its tab.

The pane’s submenu is at the top left of the panel.

You can separate a pane from its panel set by clicking and dragging the tab away. Regroup a separate pane into a panel set by dragging the tab into the set.

You can reorganize your panel sets any way you want.

There are three palettes that are docked to the right side by default. They are the palette that contains the pages, layers, and info panes, the palette containing the swatches, character, and paragraph styles panes, and the panel with color, transparency, stroke, and gradient. To add additional palettes to the side, click on one pane and drag it to the right side of your monitor. Then add any additional panes to that palette.

You can also save the sets and locations of your palettes and panes by choosing Window -> workspace -> save workspace. Then you can load that combination/arrangement of palettes using Window -> workspace and selecting your saved version from the list.

The Control Palette

This is roughly equivalent to the measurements palette in Quark XPress. It’s contents, and options, change depending on the tool or object selected.

CHARACTER CONTROL

PARAGRAPH CONTROL

OBJECT CONTROL