Ok I am trying to drag and drop pages from one 8.5" x 11" document to another 8.5" x 11 document. When I drag the pages from one document to another the pages get all broken up and I see the icon below next to the blank pages.
Has anyone ever had this issue? It won’t let me do anything and keeps crashing InDesign.
Please help!!!
I haven’t, but then I never do anything via drag-and-drop. In fact, I’d say drag-and-drop might be the best-ever example of just because you can doesn’t mean you should.
Across 2 InDesign documents, there are too any potential page-level ingongruencies to just force pages from one into the other. Spreadshufle, sections/numbering, master pages, styles, document-level preferences,and other “hooks” in the source document may conflict or of confuse upon landing in the destination document. If the 2 files are of truly identical setup in every detail (like if you start 2 new, empty files exactly the same way), dragging pages between them works pretty much perfectly. By the time content, styles, etc., are introduced in each file independently of the other, it rarely works well, and it’s best to find another way.
If it’s not a lot of pages (I dunno; fewer than 10?), and you really need everything in one document, just add new pages to the desitation document, then copy/paste-in-place the desired content, one page at a time. If it is a lot of pages, use InDesign’s book features to marry the files or Place the pages of the source into the destination.
You could also use File>place. Cause you can import an InDesign file into another.
If you hold down the shift key when you select an Indesign file you get the import options.
This way you can import, specific pages, bounding box, Bleed box and so on…
What HB said.
Abobe would do me a huge favor if it electrified your keyboard if you attempt to drag and drop.
Just a small jolt.
Especially between two different programs, but even cross windows in the same program should qualify, just so you don’t get in the habit…
Its 300 pages!! I am dragging and dropping because when editing 2 documents with the same layout, same size, same graphics but different prices its easier to grab 10 pages, drag and drop them into the new, but same size document rather than having to remember the pricing from one document to another and possibly mis-typeset the new document.
Thanks for your reply HotButton.
Thanks for the feedback Carlo!
Actually I spoke to Adobe and the icon that I originally showed everyone is a page rotate icon. They can’t explain why the page is rotating when I drag and drop from one book to another.
So I just rebuilt the entire book 
Different prices with the same layout doesn’t need a new document.
Create a new layer in the original document for each price change.
Copy the text files to the new layer and change the prices.
So you have a layer with the general layout, a layer wth the prices and a layer with the changed prices.
When you create a PDF and you want 1 price values you uncheck the other layer and so on.
I teached Indesign to some organisaions of the European Union where we have 27 different languages.
It is only one document.
One for the layout elements.
And 27 extra layers for the language changes.
Yeah the different layers was an option but when you have 4 books with 4 different prices and 2 books are full color press ready books the 3rd is b&w press ready and the 4th is low res digital version I felt it was easier to create 4 different books rather than 4 layers.
Also when I tried that originally with layers the entire book was almost a gig in file size and taking forever to make edits on. So I broke it up in to 200mb sized books which made the editing go quicker.
Thanks for the advice Carlo!
Have both documents open, then in the source document do Window > Pages. Then choose Move Pages and make sure Delete Pages after Moving is left unchecked. You’ll be able to specify which pages from the source get moved, and the exact location in the target document they get copied to.
Thanks Mojo, I may try that next time. Adobe and I came up with better solution. We made a new document (same page count) then dragged all of the original pages to the new document, saved that with a new file name and then replaced the pages from one document to the new one. Apparently the original document must have been corrupt.
I already thought so when you mentioned a size of 1GB.
That’s abnormal in InDesign.
When I save digital documents, in any progam, I always use “Save as”.
Save as clears the history of the file and makes a snapshot f the moment.
Some time ago I received a word file of 450 MB, Saves as reduced it 90MB
It was only 1gb when I tried to combine all 4 books to one document and do the multiple layers. When I do each book its about 200- 230mb per book.
I’m sure its because of the 150 pics that are all 300dpi CMYK files. When I am exporting them for digital use I can normally get them down to around 20mb but that is only 1 book. All of the others are for the press.
WOW a word doc that was 450mb? I didn’t know a word doc get get the large? Honestly I never work with word docs.
It was a guide for Bosch household equipment.
Filled with all kinds of technical drawings, that were often replaced with new versions and so on.