Re: Editing Marks - Please Help!!!

[Janice Gelb <janiceg -at- marvin -dot- eng -dot- sun -dot- com>]

In article 8EBDBEC6E497D411A92E00508B559A93795CFA -at- FERICEXCH, Geoff-H -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA ("Hart, Geoff") writes:
> However, with most small firms--and
>even with big firms without a long history of publishing--you'll almost
>certainly find what I've found: that nobody knows what the symbols mean,
>that you end up having to explain them, and that they have their own system
>of symbols anyway that you'll never get them to unlearn. In most cases, I've
>simply ended up using symbols similar to those that the in-house production
>staff had learned, and these are rarely the same as the traditional symbols.
>

We solved this by adding the marks to our style guide. I 
think if possible it's best to teach people the standard 
symbols. They may not be working for the small firm (or 
big disorganized firm) forever and the standard marks are 
just that, fairly standard.

>
>All this being said, I've found that my editing is increasingly moving
>online (in Word) rather than on paper, with the exception of proofreading
>layouts of text that I've already edited in Word. If you're working to
>become a freelance editor, it's well worth your while to learn online
>editing. It's generally faster and more efficient for you (if you're a
>reasonably skilled typist you can edit faster than you can write clearly
>longhand), it's always easier to enforce stylistic consistency (search and
>replace is a godsend), and it's faster and more efficient for the client to
>implement your edits--particularly if, like me, your handwriting borders on
>the hieroglyphic and they're never quite sure what you've written. <g>
>

I type over 100 wpm and I still find that it's faster for me to 
edit with my trusty red pen. For example, I've yet to find a 
good way to show online that I want to move something so that 
the author can see both its current location and the proposed 
new one without enormous pain: with a pen, I just have to 
draw an arrow. Plus, I'm in an environment where the writers 
don't necessarily take every edit so I can't just search and 
replace. Not to mention my worker's comp RSI :->

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Janice Gelb                      | The only connection Sun has with      
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