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I have an eight chapter book manuscript with each chapter in a separate file. I want to now merge those eight separate files into one large file so I can insert page numbers. How do I do that?
MacBook Air 13″, macOS 11.6
Pages has no external document merge feature.
I recommend that you start with a new Pages word processing document, and add seven more sections to it. Now save it to start autosave. Let's call this the master document.
In the master document thumbnail view, you will see eight section icons. Open each of the eight chapter documents in a separate Pages window, select and copy its content to the clipboard. Then select the first of your eight section icons, click in that document window, and paste. Repeat this process from each chapter document and by selecting and pasting into the respective section icon's document in the master document.
On the first page of the master document's first section, insert the page number depending on your choice of the header or footer location. The page number will be incrementally set on every page of every additional section.
Pages has no external document merge feature.
I recommend that you start with a new Pages word processing document, and add seven more sections to it. Now save it to start autosave. Let's call this the master document.
In the master document thumbnail view, you will see eight section icons. Open each of the eight chapter documents in a separate Pages window, select and copy its content to the clipboard. Then select the first of your eight section icons, click in that document window, and paste. Repeat this process from each chapter document and by selecting and pasting into the respective section icon's document in the master document.
On the first page of the master document's first section, insert the page number depending on your choice of the header or footer location. The page number will be incrementally set on every page of every additional section.
Just a follow-on thought. If you plan to do future writing that prefers individual chapters in separate files, I suggest that you look at the paid Scrivener (free trial) application which lets you divide your work into files, and then has the automated ability to stitch those individual files into one document. Scrivener is in the Mac App Store.
combining Pages files into one document
