Re: Design/readability question

["Peter Ring, PRC" <prc -at- ISA -dot- DKNET -dot- DK>]

From:          Self <Single-user mode>
To:            TECHWR-L
Subject:       Re: Design/readability question
Cc:            Jennifer Kraus <jlkraus -at- AMETEKWATER -dot- COM>
Reply-to:      prc -at- pip -dot- dknet -dot- dk
Date:          Wed, 11 Jun 1997 09:31:49 +1

On 10 Jun 1997 Jennifer Kraus > Jelinek wrote:

> I'm editing a marketing flip book that's been designed for our
> products by an outside ad agency, and I'm concerned about the
> readability. But...I want to make sure it's not just me.
>
> The book is a guide to selecting water filters and filter
> cartridges, and it's intended to be hung by our product displays
> in retail outlets and hardware stores. The basic layout consists
> of 8-1/2 by 5-1/2 pages turned lengthwise and spiral-bound. The
> front of the guide has tabs that are used to flip to various
> topics; the layout works so that the "back" of a page serves as
> the top page of a section, and the "front" of a page serves as the
> bottom page of a section. So here's my concern...the booklet is
> set up now so that when you read a section, the text (laid out in
> four narrow columns) continues from the top of the page OVER the
> spiral binding, then back up to the top of the page in the next
> column. Besides the fact that the columns are too narrow to be
> readable, it seems unnatural to me to have text that continues
> over a spiral binding.  I would naturally read the top half of the
> page (above the spiral binding) first, then proceed to the bottom
> half of the page.

Yes, I'm certainly worried, too. Sometimes ad agency solutions are
more creative than user friendly!

A solution could be to put an arrow at the bottom om the "upper"
page indicating where to continue reading like this:

text text text text text text text text text text
text text text text text text text text text text
                       |||
                      VVVVV
                       VVV
                        V
///////////////////////////////////////////////// <= spiral bind

text text text text text text text text text text
text text text text text text text text text text

Greetings from Denmark

Peter Ring
PRC (Peter Ring Consultants)
- specialists in user friendly manuals and audits on manuals.
prc -at- isa -dot- dknet -dot- dk
http://isa.dknet.dk/~prc/index.html
- the "User Friendly Manuals" website with links, bibliography, list
  of prof. associations, and tips for technical writers.

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