Category: Indexes

How things work – Bookmarks, indexes, TOC

Every now and then someone wants to know about how to handle their PDF files – specifically PDF books etc…. Let me try and explain….

For simple one song per PDF, there are no problems. You search for them by name, call them up and add them to set lists. There are no problems with this.

The problems occur when there are two or more songs in a PDF. The user wants to access the songs as if they were individual songs.

The biggest problem is that the PDF file usually has absolutely no info about what it contains.

Some people say – why not do a text search? This doesn’t work for a large majority of PDF files. They are images and don’t contain text.

There are several ways unrealBook tries to help:

Bookmarks: Creating a bookmark will make a file that “points” to a page in a PDF. You can search for these bookmarks and add them to set lists just like any other file. The disadvantage is that you need to create a bookmark for every song you have.

Table of Contents (TOC) in a file via the Go Menu: This works for dialing up songs in a PDF. The advantage is that it’s built into the PDF. The disadvantage is that hardly any PDFs have a table of contents in them. You can create your own Table of Contents using an app like PDFOutliner. BTW: Table of Contents are also called “Outlines” in PDF speak. As of unrealBook 1.93 you can create an index from the table of contents.

Indexes: This is the ultimate solution for being able to dial up any song in a PDF. Index files (.csv) allow you to create a file that describes a PDF book in a way that you can call up songs by a user-defined name and easily add them to set lists. In addition, you can reference ANY PDF in an index. You can make your own custom lists that point to any file and page. Disadvantage is that you need to create this with a spreadsheet app but once you create it, it’s done and works great. Once an index (.csv file) has been created, copy it into the unrealBook documents folder like any other PDF and rebuild the All Indexes list by pulling down on it. The newly added index will appear in the various index lists.

Read about how to create an index.

Create index with Excel

Create index using the Index Editor

Basically there are 2 main ways to access songs; by filename or by index. That’s why you can call up All Indexes from the All Files menu.

In addition, Quick Find merges the two methods into one large list.

Here are some indexes for real books which are found on the internet. They may work right away. Some might need to be adjusted for your copy of the Real Book. Copy the files into your unrealBook documents folder like any other PDF.

http://diystompboxes.com/unrealbook/csvindexes/

Remapping an entire index (.csv) to a single PDF

Here is a common problem. The index points to a PDF but the PDF name is not the same. One way to fix this is to look inside the index (.csv file) and rename the PDF file to match what is in the index.

Another way is to use the Link to new PDF command. Be aware that this will remap ALL entries in the index to the chosen PDF. So you cannot use this for indexes that point to multiple PDF files. This will basically remap all entires in the index to point to a single PDF.

Here’s how to do this:

1: Open an index and press Edit Index

2: Press the downward v (in this picture to the right of Colorado)

3: Choose Link to new PDF and choose a PDF file to remap all entries in the index to.

Once you choose a new PDF, all of the index entries will point to the new PDF.

Creating an index with Excel

Excel Version 16.17 for Macintosh can create indexes that work with unrealBook.

In Excel, create a new empty spreadsheet.

For column B copy your filename from the Finder or Explorer and paste into column B.

For column A, put the displayed title of song (no commas).

For column C, put the page number.

For column D, put the number of pages of the song.

Choose Save As… and choose CSV UTF-8 (Comma delimited) (.csv) for the File Format. Give it a suitable name.

Send the .csv to unrealBook using Air Drop, Email, Open in…. or dropbox and go to Songs->Indexes and load the index.

Manually creating indexes for large PDF files


Manually creating indexes for large PDF files

Indexes allow you to create a file containing a list of titles and pages for a specific document. Think of it as a table of contents that you can create for a large PDF book. At this time unrealBook doesn’t have an interface for creating this, but you can use a spreadsheet application to create this file. To create an index, type in the name of the song, the document name and the page number in a spreadsheet. 

1. Create a spreadsheet with the index information – OpenOffice or LibreOffice REQUIRED (free)

 

Type in the name of the song, the document name and the page number in a spreadsheet. 

format: name of song, myPDF.pdf, pageNumber

Repeat this for every song in the PDF.
Once you are finished, export your spreadsheet as a .csv file. This file should be comma delimited and should not have a text delimiter (no quotes).
Note: Make sure that the name of the pdf is case sensitive correct. In addition, make sure that it has .pdf at the end of the name. Do not put spaces before or after the filename. You must have a matching .pdf file in the documents folder for the index to reference.

You can also specify the number of pages of a song. This will allow set lists to turn through correctly when an index is added to a set list. To format your .csv correctly, create a .csv with the following format:

name of song, myPDF.pdf, pageNumber, numberOfPages
name of song2,myPDF.pdf,pageNumber, numberOfPages

OpenOffice.org or LibreOffice.org are REQUIRED for creating index files.

2. Export as csv

 

Make sure that there is no text delimiter and that the field delimiter is a comma. IMPORTANT!!!! The file character set should be UTF-8. 

3. Copy the .csv file into the unrealBook documents folder

Once the .csv file has been created, copy it into the unrealBook documents folder like any other PDF. You can then pull down on the All Indexes list to rebuild the list (which will read all .csv files).

Access your indexes in the Songs menu

 

Choose Indexes from the Songs menu

Access all indexes or a single index

 

All Indexes will list all songs of every index in a single list. Below All Indexes are the listings for each individual index.

Advanced – Verify your indexes

 

Use the +/verify button to check your indexes for simple mistakes.

Using the index editor for large PDF files


Using the index editor for large PDF files

Indexes allow you to create a file containing a list of titles and pages for a specific document. Think of it as a table of contents that you can create for a large PDF book. unrealBook now includes an index editor so you don’t need to use a computer to create and edit indexes.

Use the Songs menu and load a PDF that you want to create an index for. Go to the page that you want to create an index listing for.

Make sure that your PDF is loaded and you are on a page that you want to create a listing for.

Press the +/Verify button to start creating an index or skip to edit an existing index below.

 

Choose Create Index

 

Press the + button to create a listing

 

Press the + button to create a new listing.

Edit the title

 

Use the onscreen keyboard to change the title. Use the x button to quickly clear the title and type in a new name.

Continue the above for every page that you want a index listing for.

Repeat as many times as necessary.

Save your index

 

Press Save to save your index

Name and save your index file

 

Name and save your index.

Your index file will now be available in the Songs->Indexes menu

 

Other index editor features

 

The extra buttons from left to right in the editor are as follows:
Go to top of list.
Go to bottom of list.
Sort by title alphabetically.
If you are on a particular page of a PDF, press the Locate Page to scroll to a matching line in the index.
Email the index.