Well as my TOC (for PDF) needs to be “shorter”, I tried several ways (using a mac) to quickly and easy move the tab to the left (ie. to 5 in), but as described above…I’m loosing the structure of the index.
The cmd key thing does not work for me, all lines are left aligned, after moving the tab to the left.
I also see no option for numercial input, i.e. to simply enter “5” for all tabs.
Just make sure you have selected absolutely nothing on any lines that have a 0 left block indent. By implication, you needn’t select the entirety of the text on every line you wish to impact, only the paragraphs—i.e. don’t bother with trying to get in there perfectly on the first line—just put the mouse anywhere in that first line somewhere in the middle, drag down and release anywhere in the last line. Then hold down Command and repeat for the next indented section. Your selections needn’t look pretty, all that matters is that the selection starts anywhere in the first line you wish to impact, and ends anywhere in the last line—and never overlaps any line that shouldn’t be indented like the rest.
Alternatively, if you cannot get non-linear selections to work properly for whatever reason, make use of the Format/Text/Copy Ruler and Paste Ruler menu commands or shortcuts to apply similar formatting to different sections of text, one after the other.
You can be more precise with the Format/Text/Tabs and Indents… menu command. That will apply settings to your current selection, so it can be used for more than one line at once.