Reverse layer order?

[ldrain]

i have a bunch of pdf's that i have to get the text from. illustrator opens the files nicely, and all the text is selectable, but each line is on a different sublayer, no full paragraph can be selected. this wouldn't really be a problem, but when i go to paste the selected text into word, i get the text pasted backwards, the last line is pasted first, then the second to last, and so on.

so, anyone know if there is a way to reverse the layers so it will be pasted correctly? or any other workaround that wouldn't involve line by line pasting?

thanks in advance

[Lukas Engqvist]

Why not just export to rtf from Acrobat? Or select the text in acrobat and copy from there?

[ldrain]

because i didn't know how to do that. thanks for making me look dumb. that works great. :o

any idea if reversing is possible? might as well try to make this thread worth something. oy... :rolleyes:

[TORCH511]

After a very bad end to an otherwise good day, your humor is appreciated.

Don't feel bad, I recently had to paste a $)(@$load of text from PDFs to Indesign. I wish I had exported to RTF. I ended up selecting and pasting text from acrobat, but after trying RTF, it would have been much better.

So you ain't alone.

[The Repro Kid]

There is an easy work around idrain.

Any time you have disconnected lines of type in Illustrator, you can select all the lines at once with the selection tool (v or a, either one) and copy.

Then draw a text box with the text tool and paste. This will re-unite all the text again into one paragraph. You may have to reinsert a space or a line break here and there, but it should be fairly painless.

cheers

[kialua]

And that works with each line on different layers? Cool.

[The Repro Kid]

The layers don't really factor in Kialua. I know you're not too into Illustrator. With Illustrator you can always grab items from different layers at the same time and copy, unlike PS. Of course once you paste them back into a new text box they will wind up on the same layer, but since it's going to Word, that shouldn't be a problem.

[ldrain]

There is an easy work around idrain.

Any time you have disconnected lines of type in Illustrator, you can select all the lines at once with the selection tool (v or a, either one) and copy.

Then draw a text box with the text tool and paste. This will re-unite all the text again into one paragraph. You may have to reinsert a space or a line break here and there, but it should be fairly painless.

cheers

well isn't that slick? thanks! and welcome back?!?

i did get some decent results from the rtf export, especially once i disabled images.

funny how it knows to paste the sentences in order this way, but not any other way (ie, to word).

[The Repro Kid]

well isn't that slick? thanks! and welcome back?!?

i did get some decent results from the rtf export, especially once i disabled images.

funny how it knows to paste the sentences in order this way, but not any other way (ie, to word).Well no problem, and thanks as well.

Was surprised none of the other Illustrator "Pundits" :rolleyes: hadn't offered that one up. It's fairly common.

But I don't think it's really Illustrator's problem with the layer order, it's more than likely Word's problem, trying to respect or interpret some sort of layer order and getting it Bass Ackwards.

BTW, if you paste the copied text to a point text line instead of in a text box, you will get the entire paragraph in one long point text line.

[kialua]

BTW, if you paste the copied text to a point text line instead of in a text box, you will get the entire paragraph in one long point text line.

Erg, I have done that in Photoshop and couldn't figure out for the life of me how to fix it. And it was an extremely one sentence long line. No time to stop and figure it out so I had to sit there for 10 minute and break it where I needed it. Luckily I didn't have to resize it or the hard returns would have been a problem. :o

[The Repro Kid]

Kilua, you can draw a text box with the text tool in Photoshop just like you can in Illustrator. This would have solved you problem, as then the text would have had to have flowed within the box you drew.

[Lukas Engqvist]

The copy paste in illustrator, does join text, but there are instances where spaces tabs and line breaks are lost, which is why I suggested to go straight from PDF. Youmaygetsentenceslikethis,andtheydotakesometendin gtomakecomprehensible.