My guess, without actually firing up InDesign, is that the original doc has local formatting, for example Normal style is 12 pt Times, and some one has changed the typeface and point size “by hand”, ie not changing the style sheet. If you go into your original document, and change the style so it matches the actual point size and typeface, you might avoid this problem.

One of the many reasons I still prefer Quark, where problem workarounds are generally easier to figure out.

First off, usually when copying and pasting text into a styled paragraph, I like to use the “Paste Without Formatting” (Command + Shift + V), which will automatically assign paragraph attributes to the pasted text. This will also prevent styles from other documents from being imported.

Second, the “little + sign” means the style is unpure, in this because it’s maintaining attributes from its original document. You can make the paragraph pure again simply by Option-clicking the style.

If you hold down the Option key (and I assume the Alt key in Windows will work the same way) when you click on the paragraph style, then the style’s settings will override any other settings applied to the text. (The +plus sign indicates that the current settings of the selected text do not match the specs of the current style.)

Try holding the option key down when you click on the stylesheet you want it to have.

- Select the paragraph
- Holding the OPT key down, double-click on the style

This should work.

One of the many reasons I still prefer Quark, where problem workarounds are generally easier to figure out.

I felt this way until I became more familiar with InDesign. Workarounds are generally easy to figure out once you understand how the app works.

Until I can get InDesign tags to be as useful as Quark tags, and have the same control of kerning, I dont think I’ll be happy with InDesign, in spite of its many good features.

Tags? XML?

Maybe it’s because your paragraphs have character styles applied to them as well, try selecting no style on the character style palette.

Héctor

HI there,

The Option Key sorted out the problem. THanks for that everyone. Seems as though InDesign need to sort out the hirachy of things like that. It should just be a simple click of the button, but I guess we all have our own ways of working

Cheers

Matt, there is a clear hierarchy, outlined in the InDesign help file.

When applying styles, here’s how to control what InDesign does with existing formatting:

- To apply a paragraph style and preserve character styles, but remove overrides, hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) as you click the name of the style in the Paragraph Styles palette.

- To apply a paragraph style and remove both character styles and overrides, hold down Alt+Shift (Windows) or Option+Shift (Mac OS) as you click the name of the style in the Paragraph Styles palette.

You might want to set InDesign’s Type Preference (Accessed through Apple+,) to disregard style when pasting text from other applications.