InDesign provides the Structure pane and the Tags panel for working with XML content. The Structure pane displays all the elements in the document and their hierarchical structure. To help you identify each element, InDesign displays its element tag and an icon that indicates what type of content it holds. In addition, the Structure pane can display the first few words of text in an element, called a snippet.

Structure pane (left) and Tags panel (right)

A.

Triangles to expand or collapse elements

B.

Element (placed in layout)

C.

Element (not in layout)

D.

Text snippet

E.

Element tag

The Structure pane lets you view, edit, and manage XML elements. You use the Structure pane in many ways when working with XML. For example, to place imported XML content into the layout, you can drag elements from the Structure pane directly to a page. You also use the Structure pane to adjust the hierarchy of the elements. You can add elements, attributes, comments, and processing instructions by way of the Structure pane.

The Tags panel lists tags for elements. You can import, export, add, delete, and rename tags. You use the Tags panel to apply element tags to content that you plan to export to XML, and to apply tags to frames before importing XML content into them.