Book Page Numbers

[Chris M]

I took on a charity job for a little old lady that resembles grandma from Tweety Pie. Of course, I now wish I hadn't.

Her book about her ancestors, from a 15 year old girl being sentenced to 5 years exile in Australia in 1843 for stealing 6 buttons worth 1 shilling each, right up to the Covid-19 Pandemic. 250 pages, written over a period of 6 or 7 years, in Word, with different fonts, different formatting, different everything that could be different. However, armed only with a borrowed Designer Pro machine the whole thing was whipped into obedience; much like the poor girl tossed into a ship all those years ago.

We can now see the light at the end of the tunnel. Only page numbers and a final proof read to go. The page numbers are required to start from page 9 onwards. Granny wants the first 8 un-numbered as they are pedigree charts, salutations and general 'stuff'. I failed. I can't keep the first 8 pages number free.

Does anybody have a trick that would work for this poor old lady (okay, me). Think of that young girl who wouldn't have been told that absolutely everything in Australia is poisonous and wants to kill you. Nor would she have been told those giant hoppy things randomly jump out of the bush right in front of your car for no apparent reason whatsoever. Don't let her suffering be in vain.

[Christine Farrelly]

Can you not just place a box over the page numbers you don't want to show.

[handrawn]

Adding page numbers
To quickly add page numbers into your document - use the INSERT menu to select PAGE
NUMBER and choose a number format and a page position from the INSERT PAGE NUMBER
dialog. They will appear as Repeating Objects (on page 105) throughout your document.

By default the first page of your document will be 1, but if you have pages which you
don't want numbered at the start of the document, like contents or acknowledgments
pages, then you can get round this by giving the first page a - (minus) value. So if you
have three pages of content that you don't want numbered, enter -2 into the FIRST PAGE
IS: field, and then the pages you want to be numbered will start at 1. The sequence will
be...
-2, -1, 0, 1 etc.

Then delete the minus and zero page numbers from your document. If using numeral
values the - (minus) number will be replaced by a #.

from the manual - hope it helps - not done it myself you understand

[Chris M]

Can you not just place a box over the page numbers you don't want to show.

Unfortunately, no. I want page 9 to show as page 1. Covering the numbers would still leave page 9 as showing '9'.

[Chris M]

from the manual - hope it helps - not done it myself you understand

I did try this, but it counted down from -8 to -1, then 9. However, I'll do it again as I didn't delete the -8 to -1...maybe that's the trick.

Nope, didn't work. I also tried cutting the first 8 pages, insert the page numbers, then told them to stop repeating. I then pasted the first 8 back in place. The first 8 had no numbers...I was encouraged. Hopped down to the ninth page...'9', loud and proud.

One step closer though. If I can stop the numbers updating, rather than repeating, the above method would work.

[handrawn]

Gary P does books in xara - he may know - last time I did a book in xdp it didnt have page numbers, had to do it manually !

[gwpriester]

Yep. Page numbering is always a PITA.

The first page in the book is an odd number, The first left is the inside cover. So page 1 is the first right facing page. And most books do not start until the front matter is covered, copyright page, title page, etc. This should not be that hard but whoever came up with this numbering scheme never designed a book.

Once you finally get the numbers to work then you can delete the prior - numbers and select Delete from just this page.

[Egg Bramhill]

Try this:

[Acorn]

Chris, these approaches are separate:

Xara

• Use existing & repeating page numbering or Insert > Page number.
• Change the starting value on the first page to -8.
• Delete from the first eight pages.

JavaScript

• Create a Text blob - I used Bold Red "Page Number" as boilerplate; anything you fancy as it is replaced.
• Make Repeating Object.
• Delete from the first eight pages.
• Add Name, htmlclass="pageNo".
• Add Website Code (body):
  <script>
  $('.pageNo').each( function(page) {
  $(this).text("Page " + (page + 1)); // Its starting number
  });
  </script>
• Ensure some shape has the special Name, UsesJQuery.

CSS

• Create a Text blob - I used Bold Red " " (a space) as boilerplate.
• Make Repeating Object.
• Delete from the first eight pages.
• Add Name, htmlclass="pageNo".
• Add Website Code (head):
  <style>
  body {
  /* Set "my-page-counter" to its pre-starting number */
  counter-reset: my-page-counter 0;
  }
  .pageNo::before {
  /* Increment "my-page-counter" by 1 */
  content: " Page " counter(my-page-counter);
  counter-increment: my-page-counter;
  }
  </style>

Do note the last two do not render directly into PDF, but I included then as they are, by far, more versatile than Xara.

Acorn

[gwpriester]

Acorn - How hard do you think this would be for Xara to implement? It is so basic. Click page. Start page numbers HERE.