Breaking up a large document

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Guest

I have a document with several chapters. I would like to break it up so that
there is a separate file for each chapter. Is there a way to create separate
files and keep the table of contents, chapter numbers, and page numbers the
same as they are in the complete document?
 
I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for but we have a manual that is
10 pages long but what it consists of is a 3 page table of contents that link
to chapters and each chapter has listings that link to separate documents
that detail the procedures. So you could create individual documents that
detail your chapters and just use hyperlinks to link to those documents. If
you wanted to view it, I could email you the document but none of the links
would work without me emailing you each document... but you'd have an idea of
what it would look like. Let me know.
 
This is precisely what Master Documents are for. The master contains the
title material and TOC, then each of the chapters, in its own file, as a
sub-document. HOWEVER, master documents are notorious for becoming corrupt,
they create a whole lot of new problems, and all-in-all, most people find
them a total PIB to work with.
 
You can't exactly keep them the same, unless you are totally done editing
and you want to convert them to plain text that will no longer update.

You can recreate the doc in a way that lets you do what you want. A couple
options.

1) break the doc into chapters, then use RD fields to build a TOC from
several files. See here for detailed instructions, though I'm not sure if
that includes the index.
Creating a Table of Contents Spanning Multiple Documents
http://pubs.logicalexpressions.com/Pub0009/LPMArticle.asp?ID=148

2) break the doc into chapters, then use IncludeText fields to create a
combined doc that pulls the text from each chapter (to create an IncludeText
field, start a new doc, and use Insert | File for each chapter, but be sure
to check "link to file" in the Insert | File dialog). Then you could
generate the TOC, index, and page numbers in the combined document.

Both these options pretty much require that you be familiar with styles and
templates, I think, so if those are unfamiliar terms to you, post back. But
presumably you are already using styles in your long document.

If those don't work, if you explain the end result that you need and why,
others may have better suggestions.

As Jezebel said, *do not* be tempted by Master Documents, although
supposedly they exist to fix this problem.

DM
 
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