I have this GREP style that bolds text before a colon but I would like to do this without a colon.

I have done this as a paragraph style to apply bold to list of abbreviations.


When I have replaced the : for a GREP style for tab it doesn't work but I assume I am missing something out here.

  • 1
    What is the GREP request you tried ? Besides, do you need GREP style here? Couldn't it be achieved with nested styles? – Vinny Jul 27 '17 at 12:36
  • 1
    Just replace the colon with a tab symbol (\t if memory serves) in the GREP code. As Vinny says, though, a nested style would probably be better for your needs here. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 27 '17 at 12:36
  • I tried this \t but it didn't seem to work. but nested styles did thank you – Samuel Foreman Jul 27 '17 at 13:52
  • Glad you solved your issue, but surprised that ^[^\t]+ didn't work! – Vinny Jul 27 '17 at 14:20
  • I will just toss in something I recently learned--when you are using nested styles, you can place more than one element in the "after" field and it will work for any of them. So, for example, I have a nested style that applies bold after any of these: tab character or : or an M hyphen. – magerber Jul 27 '17 at 21:37

If you are inserting your bullets manually, your GREP style would be:
-where the "•" is the bullet character you're using. Replace that character with whatever character you want to use as a bullet.

However, the "proper" way to do this doesn't require GREP at all. I suggest you create a paragraph style that defines the bullet list and just apply your character style to the bullets under "Bullets and Numbering."

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