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Is it possible to reference two anchor texts hyperlinks for the same paragraph in Indesign?

I can create two different anchor texts for the same paragraph. However, when inserting the cross-reference, only one seems available.

I would prefer to avoid complex scripting solutions.

EDIT: To make it clear, Document B has a paragraph. Document A has two links to the Anchor Text associated to the paragraph of Document B. I need to define two different anchor texts for the same paragraph in Document B (which is possible and I have done it) and then being able to "select" a different anchor in Document A per each of the links. This last bit is where the problem is, because when inserting the cross-reference and pointing to the paragraph, only one anchor text is available.

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It's certainly possible, and I'm not able to find a problem with it in any of the current versions (CS6, CC, CC 2014) of InDesign. There were some issues with cross-references that spanned documents using the Book feature, but I believe they were fixed somewhere between CS4 and CS5.

Do make sure that your text anchors don't overlap (each should be a different bit of text in the paragraph), which would probably cause all kinds of confusion, but other than that there should be no issue.

Be sure that you select "Text Anchor" and not "Paragraph" when setting up the Hyperlink Destination:

New destination

and when you invoke Type > Hyperlinks & Cross-References > Insert Cross-Reference you must also ensure that "Link To" is set to "Text Anchor," not "Paragraph" in the dialog:

Insert x-ref

If you still only see one text anchor in your dropdown, export your document to IDML (File > Export > InDesign Markup) and create a new document from that. If even that doesn't do it, delete your InDesign preferences file (hold down Ctl-Alt-Shift or Cmd-Opt-Shift while starting InDesign and click "Yes" in the dialog) and try again.

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  • I have been checking this but I am not sure my question was clear. So I have a paragraph in Document B, and I have created two anchor texts for the same paragraph (same position). Is this what you meant with overlap? My question is how to "choose" one anchor text or another from Document A when referencing the exact same paragraph.
    – user1156544
    Jul 18, 2014 at 20:24
  • I've expanded the answer. I suspect you're choosing "Paragraph" instead of "Text Anchor" in your workflow.
    – Alan Gilbertson
    Jul 20, 2014 at 0:37

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