Daily Dose of DTP: 32. Smoothing Out the Ragged Edges

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Daily Dose of DTP 32. Smoothing Out the Ragged Edges From Jacci Howard Bear, your Guide to Desktop Publishing After banishing those extra spaces in your text and toning down the type, you now must decide the best way to line up your lines of text. Text alignment (also known as justification) refers to how the ends of lines of text line up. Most text in books, magazines, and other reading material is lined up on the left side (in those countries where materials are primarily read from left to right). Some people also like to align the right side as well as the left. That's called fully-justified text alignment. In desktop publishing we have rules to help you decide which alignment to use. Class Notes: This is not simply a word-a-day course. The lessons follow a specific order in roughly the following groupings: General concepts > Things you need > Font specifics > Image specifics > Prepress & Printing > Rules & Tutorials (bold indicates the stage in which this lesson falls) Rule #4 of Desktop Publishing Use Ragged Right or Full Justification Appropriately There will undoubtedly be well-meaning friends, business associates, clients, and others who will question your choices for text alignment. Be prepared to explain why you chose the alignment you did and be prepared to change it (and make necessary adjustments to keep it looking good) if the person with final approval still insists on something different. Today's Trivia Justify Your Alignment As I mentioned in the introduction, justification is another term for text alignment. Here are some more alignment terms that mean the same thing: Left-Aligned = Ragged-Right Fully-Justified = Justified (aligned on both left and right) Right-Aligned = Ragged-Left (less commonly used term) In Fully-Justified text the last line of a paragraph may stop short of the right edge and not be fully-justified. Some programs have forced justification which forces that last short line to stretch from left to right. Be careful with that feature. It can cause three little words to space out to fill a space normally occupied by 15 or 20 words or more and make for very ugly text. This email is written by: Jacci Howard Bear Desktop Publishing Guide Email Me | My Blog | My Forum   Missing a lesson? Click here. About U. is our collection of free online courses designed to help you learn a new skill, solve a problem, get something done, or just learn more about your world. Sign up now, and we will email you lessons on a daily or weekly basis. You are receiving this email because you subscribed to the About.com 'Daily Dose of DTP' email. If you wish to unsubscribe, please click here. About respects your privacy: Our Privacy Policy Contact Information: 249 West 17th Street New York, NY, 10011 © 2010 About.com   Advertisement