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#11
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Top-end typography programs do this
automatically. "Top-end" excludes the most widely used ones like Quark and InDesign, I guess? The main problems in Word seems to me the rather large default space, and the fact that hyphenation doesn't always works as well as one could wish. WP justification helps with the former, and you can check/improve on hyphenation manually. One thing to look out for is that kerning is enabled (Format Font Character spacing). Regards, Klaus |
#12
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Kerning obviously won't help for this problem, though.
"Klaus Linke" wrote in message ... Top-end typography programs do this automatically. "Top-end" excludes the most widely used ones like Quark and InDesign, I guess? The main problems in Word seems to me the rather large default space, and the fact that hyphenation doesn't always works as well as one could wish. WP justification helps with the former, and you can check/improve on hyphenation manually. One thing to look out for is that kerning is enabled (Format Font Character spacing). Regards, Klaus |
#13
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"Jezebel" wrote:
Kerning obviously won't help for this problem, though. Well, the topic was "between-character kerning", and many, many users don't even know that this is turned off by default. Klaus |
#14
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Hi Jezebel,
BTW, I'd be interested in some source for your statements. What typesetting systems do use variations in letter spacing to justify lines? I've seen it only used in some newspapers, and it looked ghastly. I could imagine that it might make some sense for newspapers if used very, very sparingly and carefully. But unless your columns are very narrow, it simply isn't needed. Greetings, Klaus |
#15
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On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 18:45:06 +1000, Jezebel wrote:
The problem is that for typographic purposes the expansion is specific to the *line* not the paragraph. One of the objectives in typography is to minimise the variation in the width of the spaces between words. This can be difficult if you are justifying to a narrow measure -- if there is just one space within the line, it has to take up ALL the justification space for the line. One typographic method for dealing with the problem is to cheat a little and increase the character spacing *in that line* -- but not in other lines in the same paragraph. Top-end typography programs do this automatically. "Robert" wrote in message .. . Greetings-- If you want to restrict expanded character spacing to a specific type of paragraph, it is as easy to create any appropriate style with this feature and apply it to the relevant paragraphs. Where is the problem? I have personally used this trick quite successfully. It does serve this purpose. -- Cheers Robert On Thu, 2 Sep 2004 14:12:18 +1000, Jezebel wrote: "Robert" wrote in message ... Greetings-- Expanded character spacing can be part of a style. If you make it part of the document Normal style, it will be applied to all of it. -- That's why it doesn't help for this purpose. Greetings-- With Word 2003, styles can be applied to part of a paragraph only if need be (using the so-called "StyleSeparator" command.) So expanded character spacing can be part of a style and can be applied to any length of text, as desired. But of course, this has to be done manually. -- Cheers Robert |
#16
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Absolutely right that it usually looks awful. But typography is the art of
compromise: awful as it might look, the alternatives (such as a 3em word space) might be worse). Then again -- as with a great deal of typography -- if it's done well you don't notice it. And yes, it's normally only newspapers that print to columns narrow enough to need it. "Klaus Linke" wrote in message ... Hi Jezebel, BTW, I'd be interested in some source for your statements. What typesetting systems do use variations in letter spacing to justify lines? I've seen it only used in some newspapers, and it looked ghastly. I could imagine that it might make some sense for newspapers if used very, very sparingly and carefully. But unless your columns are very narrow, it simply isn't needed. Greetings, Klaus |
#17
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With Word 2003, styles can be applied to part of a paragraph only if need be (using the so-called "StyleSeparator" command.) So expanded character spacing can be part of a style and can be applied to any length of text, as desired. But of course, this has to be done manually. Exactly. That was the OP's complaint in the first place. |
#18
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Hi Jezebel,
Now *I* have to agree 100% with you. BTW, remember when we discussed how "proper" typesetting programs optimized line breaks globally (Knuth...)? Well, I got myself InDesign recently. Right on the first book I did with it, the editor who proof-read it marked *every* line where InDesign had put a word on the next line because of global optimizations as an error. Since I couldn't convince him that this was aesthetically more pleasing and the proper way to do left-justified text, I finally had to break hundreds of lines by hand to "fix" it :-( Regards, Klaus "Jezebel" wrote: Absolutely right that it usually looks awful. But typography is the art of compromise: awful as it might look, the alternatives (such as a 3em word space) might be worse). Then again -- as with a great deal of typography -- if it's done well you don't notice it. And yes, it's normally only newspapers that print to columns narrow enough to need it. |
#19
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I do remember the discussion.
Perhaps you should have 'fixed' the editor ... If you're interested in typographical arcana, have a look at 'Le Ton Beau de Marot' by Hofstatter (he of Godel Escher and Bach fame) -- see if you can pick the typographic jokes. It's cute, but also a classic example of why writers -- even clever ones -- shouldn't be allowed to do their own typography! Do you want a "I'd rather be kerning" bumper sticker? "Klaus Linke" wrote in message ... Hi Jezebel, Now *I* have to agree 100% with you. BTW, remember when we discussed how "proper" typesetting programs optimized line breaks globally (Knuth...)? Well, I got myself InDesign recently. Right on the first book I did with it, the editor who proof-read it marked *every* line where InDesign had put a word on the next line because of global optimizations as an error. Since I couldn't convince him that this was aesthetically more pleasing and the proper way to do left-justified text, I finally had to break hundreds of lines by hand to "fix" it :-( Regards, Klaus "Jezebel" wrote: Absolutely right that it usually looks awful. But typography is the art of compromise: awful as it might look, the alternatives (such as a 3em word space) might be worse). Then again -- as with a great deal of typography -- if it's done well you don't notice it. And yes, it's normally only newspapers that print to columns narrow enough to need it. |
#20
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Perhaps you should have 'fixed' the editor ...
I'm Walter Mitty the Undefeatable, and editors cannot faze me. Do you want a "I'd rather be kerning" bumper sticker? "Kerning" sounds like a fun thing to do... By all means! Regards, Klaus |
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