Page 243 - Xara Designer Pro X17

Text Handling 243

existing SmartField before clicking ADD, the new field is added following the selected
field. Otherwise it’s added at the bottom of the list. The order of the PERSONAL
SMARTFIELDS is remembered too.

To delete a SmartField you don’t need, click on it to select it and then click the DELETE
button.

Inserting & Editing in Text
To insert a SmartField into your document, make sure you are in the TEXT TOOL, place
the text caret where you want to insert the SmartField, then right click and choose
"INSERT > SMARTFIELDS… select the Field you want to insert, and click the INSERT button.
If you want to insert multiple SmartFields you can keep the dialog open, move the text
caret to a new position and then select and insert another field.

You can select SmartFields in text just as you select ordinary text, and apply text
attributes to them in the usual way. You can’t place the text caret in the middle of a
SmartField - it behaves as a single object in the text, similar to how embedded objects
(on page 215) work.

If you want to edit the value of a SmartField, you can right-click on it in the text and
choose EDIT SMARTFIELD from the context menu. The SmartFields dialog opens showing
the DOCUMENT SMARTFIELDS and the target SmartField is pre-selected, so you can edit its
value and it will update wherever that field appears in text of the current document.

Updating SmartFields
The UPDATE button in the SMARTFIELDS DIALOG checks the current values of your
PERSONAL SMARTFIELDS against those in the current document, and updates the fields in
the document if they differ. So use this to update existing documents if you have
changed your PERSONAL SMARTFIELDS since the document was edited.

Linking to SmartFields

You can create a link to a SmartField that contain URL's in the UTILITIES > WEB
PROPERTIES > LINK dialog. This will allow you to enter custom text such as "Click here"
but still use the value in your SmartFields to an email address or website link.

Alternatively, you can create a pair of SmartFields where one specifies the text to be
shown, and the other that specifies the URL to be applied. To do this, add :text and :link
to the end of the SmartField name. For example, you could enter website:link and
website:text. Xara will link these two together, so whatever text you enter in website:text
will link to the website:link URL.

Inserting a Table of Contents (TOC)

The option "INSERT" > "TABLE OF CONTENTS…" builds a table of contents (TOC)
automatically and inserts it at the text caret.