I have some xml or excel I want to loop through this document in InDesign script and insert values on defined places this is excel or xml

this I want to get

I don't have so much scripting experiences so I can only this piece of code

var doc = app.activeDocument;
var myFile = File("~/Desktop/test.xml");
var textExcel = doc.textFrames.add();
textExcel.geometricBounds = [50, 80, 10, 150];
textExcel.place(myFile);

but now how I can get a single value? for example in indesign template first paragraph should look like table --> lorem--> 150

CodePudding user response：

Here is the possible solution:

var doc = app.activeDocument;

// get a text from the XLSX file
var inputFile = File("d:/table.xlsx");
var temp_frame = doc.textFrames.add();
temp_frame.place(inputFile);
var text = temp_frame.parentStory.contents;
temp_frame.remove();

// make a table from the text
var rows = text.split('\r');
var table = [];
for (var i = 1; i < rows.length; i  ) table.push(rows[i].split('\t'));

// loop through the table and make the cards
for (var i = 0; i < table.length; i  ) {

    var title       = table[i][0];
    var description = table[i][1];
    var price       = table[i][2];

    var card = make_card(title, description, price);

    // move the card to some places
    card.move([10,10]);
    card.move(undefined, [i*75, 0]);
}

// the function to create and return a card
function make_card(title, description, price) {
    var doc = app.activeDocument;

    var title_frame = doc.textFrames.add();
    title_frame.geometricBounds = [20, 80, 30, 150];
    title_frame.contents = title;

    var description_frame = doc.textFrames.add();
    description_frame.geometricBounds = [30, 80, 80, 150];
    description_frame.contents = description;

    var price_frame = doc.textFrames.add();
    price_frame.geometricBounds = [80, 80, 100, 150];
    price_frame.contents = price;

    // apply styles to the texts in the card
    apply_style('title', title_frame);
    apply_style('description', description_frame);
    apply_style('price', price_frame);

    var group = doc.groups.add([title_frame, description_frame, price_frame]);
    return group;
}

function apply_style(style_name, frame) {
    var doc = app.activeDocument;
    try {
        var style = doc.paragraphStyles.itemByName(style_name);
        frame.paragraphs.everyItem().appliedParagraphStyle = style;
    } catch(e) {}
}

This is the XLSX table:

Here is the result layout (3 cards):

It creates cards from XLSX file (applies the styles to the texts inside cards, why not?) and put them on the page of the current document.

CodePudding user response：

You can probably do this with xpath and Document. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Document/evaluate

You create a new Document with the xml and you evaluate a xPath.