Tables of Contents, Indexes and Other Special Tables in Scribus

Bruce Byfield — Thu, 12 May 2011 13:00:00 +0000

Creating special tables in Scribus is not a straightforward task. The controls are scattered, and few users are likely to decipher the necessary steps or their necessary order without help. However, each step in creating a table of contents (TOC), index, or frame is simple in itself, and, once one is added, you can edit the result exactly as you would the contents of any text frame.

Because a special table depends on the information in the rest of the document, you need to add it after you are finished the document. Otherwise, you will simply have to regenerate it more than once. Avoiding this extra work means either leaving space on a page for adding the special table, or adding pages at the start or end of the document. For an index, whose entries are often short but numerous, you may want to create a two or three column layout, with connected text frames on two or more pages.

In addition, for a TOC and many indexes -- especially in a technical document -- you consider using sub-headings, each in a separate text frame, formatted with a paragraph style named something like Heading1 or Sub-Head. If you do, then finding the text frames you want to add to the special table will be easier.

Just as importantly, you won't need to come up with a meaningful tag as you create the special table, which can be mentally challenging, especially if you are adding the table after long hours of writing and editing. You can simply copy the text of the sub-heading.

Before you begin to create the special table, you will also need at least one paragraph style for its contents. If you have several levels of sub-headings, and want them to be visible in the special table, then you should also create a paragraph style for each level, even though initially only one will be used in the special table. Should you want leader dots to connect a table entry and its page number, you can edit the paragraph styles for the table so that the tabs use a fill character -- although this is a sloppy layout habit that you should avoid if at all possible.

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Tables of Contents, Indexes and Other Special Tables in Scribus