--- a/src/reportlab/platypus/paraparser.py	Thu Jul 02 08:12:53 2009 +0000
+++ b/src/reportlab/platypus/paraparser.py	Thu Jul 02 13:53:21 2009 +0000
@@ -9,6 +9,11 @@
 import sys
 import os
 import copy
+import base64
+try:
+    import cPickle as pickle
+except:
+    import pickle
 import unicodedata
 import reportlab.lib.sequencer
 from reportlab.lib.abag import ABag
@@ -176,6 +181,8 @@
 _indexAttrMap = {
                 'name': ('name',None),
                 'item': ('item',None),
+                'offset': ('offset',None),
+                'format': ('format',None),
                 }
 
 def _addAttributeNames(m):
@@ -896,13 +903,23 @@
         attr=self.getAttributes(attr,_indexAttrMap)
         defn = ABag()
         if attr.has_key('item'):
-            defn.label = attr['item']
+            label = attr['item']
         else:
             self._syntax_error('<index> needs at least an item attribute')
         if attr.has_key('name'):
             name = attr['name']
         else:
             name = DEFAULT_INDEX_NAME
+        format = attr.get('format',None)
+        if format is not None and format not in ('123','I','i','ABC','abc'):
+            raise ValueError('index tag format is %r not valid 123 I i ABC or abc' % offset)
+        offset = attr.get('offset',None)
+        if offset is not None:
+            try:
+                offset = int(offset)
+            except:
+                raise ValueError('index tag offset is %r not an int' % offset)
+        defn.label = base64.encodestring(cPickle.dumps((label,format,offset))).strip
         defn.name = name
         defn.kind='index'
         self._push(cbDefn=defn)