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Subject:What's the point From:Hollister Technical Services <Holtec -at- COMITY -dot- DEMON -dot- CO -dot- UK> Date:Thu, 7 Jan 1999 16:19:52 +0000
Folks,
Having seen Karen Shriver's book on Document Design praised I went out
and bought it. It is excellent. She states that the point, used nearly
universally to measure text, is (only) nearly 1/72 of an inch. I thought
it was exactly 1/72 inch so I looked it up (Graphic Arts Encyclopedia:
McGraw Hill, amongst others). It is defined (since 1886) as 0.013837
inch so that 72 points is 0.996264 inch.
I looked in the archive to see if there was anything on point size but
did not find anything relevant.
My questions (at last): How did we get this (bizarre) unit? Where does
it come from? Also, where can I get an accurate point type-scale (that
does not assume exactly 72 points per inch)?
--
Peter Jones
e-mail Holtec -at- comity -dot- demon -dot- co -dot- uk
