Author note: In Adobe InDesign CS6, the changes to InDesign's scripting DOM are absolutely minimal. Therefore, the information in this title is valid and up to date for CS6.

Updated: August 2010. Author Peter Kahrel updated this Short Cut to cover InDesign CS5. InDesign provides a powerful set of tools for producing beautiful documents. While you can certainly do all your work by hand through InDesign's graphical interface, there are many times when it's much easier to write a script. Once you've automated a task, you can run it over the whole document, ensuring consistency, or just when you need it, simplifying and speeding your layout process. All it takes is a bit of JavaScript knowledge and a willingness to explore InDesign's programming features.