TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
Re: document design: I don't know what I don't know
Subject:Re: document design: I don't know what I don't know From:Chris Morton <salt -dot- morton -at- gmail -dot- com> To:techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com Date:Wed, 29 Aug 2012 11:29:11 -0700
No course like this would be complete without a discussion on leading (line
spacing), paragraph spacing and, to a lesser degree, kerning. Also when
it's a good idea to use justified text (and more importantly, when *not* to
use it). Use of soft vs. hard carriage returns, how to force text onto a
new page (read: MS Word), how to create running headers, formatting TOCs...
Also some discussion about appropriate font sizes and font choices for use
in projected documents (e.g., PowerPoint), taking into consideration the
limits of projected imagery, room size, etc. Here it is good practice to
have no more than three bullet points per slide, spilling over to a second
and third slide (having the same title and a "continued" symbol) as
necessary if there are additional bullet points under that topic.
> Chris
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Create and publish documentation through multiple channels with Doc-To-Help. Choose your authoring formats and get any output you may need.
Try Doc-To-Help, now with MS SharePoint integration, free for 30-days.