Your first story

The smallest story that renders a line of text is three nested ranges wrapped around one line of Content.

In short: A story is the smallest interesting thing in an IDML document — the text itself. The minimal version is a Story element containing one ParagraphStyleRange, containing one CharacterStyleRange, containing one Content element with a single line of text. Reading it from the inside out shows the spine that every IDML story shares; longer stories just add more ranges. This page walks that minimal story line by line.

A story is the smallest interesting thing in an IDML document: the text itself. Here is the complete story from the smallest valid package — three nested ranges and one line of Content. Edit the Content text and, once the live preview lands, the page will re-render.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<idPkg:Story xmlns:idPkg="http://ns.adobe.com/AdobeInDesign/idml/1.0/packaging" DOMVersion="20.0">
  <Story Self="ustory">
    <ParagraphStyleRange AppliedParagraphStyle="ParagraphStyle/$ID/[No paragraph style]">
      <CharacterStyleRange AppliedCharacterStyle="CharacterStyle/$ID/[No character style]">
        <Content>Hello, paged media.</Content>
      </CharacterStyleRange>
    </ParagraphStyleRange>
  </Story>
</idPkg:Story>

Read it inside out:

1. Content holds the literal text.
2. The CharacterStyleRange around it says how those characters are styled — here, the default character style.
3. The ParagraphStyleRange around that says which paragraph the run belongs to — here, the default paragraph style.
4. The Story wraps the lot and carries the Self id that a frame points at to display this text.

That nesting — story › paragraph range › character range › content — is the spine of all IDML text. Longer stories just have more ranges.

🚧 The next steps (adding a second paragraph, changing the style) are being written; the example above is real and validated against the renderer.

Frequently asked questions

What is the minimum a story needs to render a line of text? A Story element wrapping one ParagraphStyleRange, wrapping one CharacterStyleRange, wrapping one Content element with the text. The example above is exactly that — the complete story from the smallest valid package.

Why are there three nested elements around a single line of text? Each level carries a different kind of meaning: the ParagraphStyleRange says which paragraph the text belongs to, the CharacterStyleRange says how those characters are styled, and the Content holds the literal characters. The outer Story carries the Self id a frame points at to display the text.

How does a story grow beyond one line? By adding more ranges. A second paragraph is another ParagraphStyleRange sibling; a change in character formatting is another CharacterStyleRange. The story › paragraph range › character range › content nesting stays the same — see story structure for the full model.