Indexer - an Indexing Tool

		You have a book. You need an index. You want to do it yourself.		Indexer (May 7, 2006) by zweibieren physpics.com
		Indexer can help. Indexer shows you your text, the index entries for each page, and a list of all possible index terms. With just two mouse clicks you add an entry to a page. When you are done, Indexer formats the index from your entries.

Indexer works with plain text from Word Perfect, MSWord, or any other word processor. At present it produces output for only one publisher's format, but more will be added as users request.

Professional indexing tools like CINDEX and SKY Index concentrate on editing the index itself. Indexer concetrates on a prior task--ensuring that the right index entries are associated with each page of text. In some situations, Indexer will be a valuable front end to these more index-focussed tools. Other tools augment one specific word processor, as DEXter works with MSWord. For a list of other tools, see Software Tools for Indexing.

Indexer requires Java runtime (JRE 5.0). Sun offers tools to check your Java version and download JRE 5.0. If you have or are willing to load JRE 5.0, you can launch a demo version of Indexer from here.

Indexer has created one index, the one for my wife's recently published book. Now it needs a few more users to work with it as I revise and extend it. For these users, I promise to offset the lack of present features with personal attention and rapid augmentation. To become a user, ask me for a download.

Read the Help file. Or just this extract:

Indexer displays the pages of a book and the index entries for each page. You use Indexer to add entries, delete entries, and create new terms that can be applied as entries to pages. Finally, the Create Index command combines the entries from all pages to produce the index.

At the right is a sketch of the main Indexer window.: page number to the left, text of the page in the middle, and applicable index entries on the right. Yellow highlights the current work area, where one or more entries are highlit in blue. Those entries can be deleted by clicking the Remove Entry button.
Available index terms are in a separate window like the one at the right. One or more consecutive terms are highlit in blue. These will be inserted in the yellow area if the Add Entry button is clicked. The Create new term... button prompts for and adds a new term to the list. You can have multiple terms window showing different parts of the set of terms.

The index can be output as text or HTML. Here's a sample in HTML.

labor force: composition of, 67, 94, 96, 103, 131, 188n8–9, 191n10; growth in, 103, 108, 110, 111, 117, 174, 177, 180
labor party, xi, 14, 15, 20, 21, 122, 124-127, 184n3
labor union: membership, 4, 15, 16, 35, 36, 52, 57, 59, 74, 81, 93, 94, 159, 189n21, 194n19