Whether you have recently returned from an Adobe InDesign Training seminar, are an old hand with InDesign, or are currently considering attending an Adobe Creative Suite Training to update your skills to the latest versions of the software. It is important that you understand how useful gaining a working knowledge of the Adobe InDesign Exchange can be.

The Adobe InDesign Exchange is a community of people that allows the users to install extensions, plug-ins and other enhancements to their copy of Adobe InDesign. The many benefits for users include:

1) Access to free enhancements for InDesign

The Adobe InDesign Exchange has a surprising amount of free software enhancements for Adobe InDesign that considerably enhance the basic product. These are easily found either by visiting the Adobe Exchange online, or by installing a free panel upgrade to InDesign that lets you search the exchange from within the program itself.

Examples of free enhancements to InDesign that are available at the exchange include a Calendar Wizard that makes it a breeze to produce calendars from within InDesign, a PDF multipage import facility, and various print tools that give you access to new ways of showing the output from InDesign.

Adobe has tools that allow you to see the most recent additions to the exchange, the most popular and the highest rated. So it is relatively easy to discover new tools that could make your life easier at the exchange in just a few minutes.

2) Access to other users Paid Enhancements for InDesign

The fact is that InDesign is not a cheap product, but that it may still lack some essential features that you really need in order to carry out your DTP process flow.

If that is the case it may be that someone has already developed a paid enhancement to InDesign that massively assists you.

Normally these are available for under $ 100 (and often much cheaper), but can help you to achieve tasks in InDesign that may previously have taken you hours, but which can now be accomplished in minutes.

An example of this is the Mail Order Catalog InDesign Template which is available on the InDesign Exchange for just $ 6. This template allows you to quickly create a 16 page catalog in InDesign, without having to create all the layout for yourself.

For the cost this is an amazing bargain.

3) You can achieve more with InDesign

Even if you aren't an expert InDesign user you can often appear to be simply by downloading the right pack from the InDesign Exchange to assist you.

This means that you have much more scope and leverage in the types of design projects that you can take on, because as long as there is something to help on the exchange then you know that you are safe to accept the project!

Overall, becoming fully familiar with the InDesign Exchange is a MUST regardless of your experience level with the program.

It can help you to get more done, more easily and with less work.