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#1
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Spacing recommendations
Does anyone have guidelines or "best practices" regarding the use of
Word's paragraph spacing capabilities ?? For example, suppose I want 12 points of space in between any given pair of consecutive "body" paragraphs. How should I define my "body" style ? Should I use: (1) 12 points before and zero points after, or (2) Zero points before and 12 after, or (3) 6 points before and 6 after (4) Something else It seems to me that #3 works best. The only downside is that the 6 pts of "space before" prevents me from putting headings close to my body paragraphs (which I sometimes want to do). I have tried #2, also, and it seems to create a lot of extra work with spacing around figures, tables, and bulleted lists. For your amusement ... many years ago, I edited some docs from the documentation group at Microsoft. Their approach was to put in an extra carriage return, and then adjust its height. I hope that's not the best approach these days. thanks bk |
#2
Posted to microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs
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Spacing recommendations
Don't ever base usage on documents from Microsoft; most Softies have no idea
how to use Word. I've taught many MS grandmothers to suck eggs, including some in the Office User Assistance ("Help") department. That said, a lot of the oldest templates I have, based on letter templates that shipped with Word 2.0, have #3 spacing (6 points Before and After), and this does have its points. As a rule, I prefer using Spacing After (for the mentioned reasons having to do with headings), and you'll note that the built-in Body Text style has just 6 points After. It's rarely necessary to have a full 12 points between paragraphs of 12-point text, IMO. If you format lists with no Spacing Before (depending on the 6 points from the Body Text) and 6 points After, then enable "Don't add space between paragraphs of the same style," you can have tightly spaced lists and still have 6 points After. No matter what you do, you'll sometimes have to fudge. I have a Body Text Space Before style, with 12 points Spacing Before, that I use in fiction where the author wants to indicate a break, or after tables where I need extra space, etc. I have Body Text set as the following style. And sometimes you'll just have to apply direct formatting to get a desired effect. I can usually make do without empty paragraphs EXCEPT around TOCs. Here they are vital because the "empty paragraph" that appears to be below the TOC is actually inside the TOC field, and you can't insert a page break, a second TOC, or anything else in that paragraph without making it part of the TOC. This can be incredibly frustrating, especially when the TOC completely fills the page and the empty paragraph is forcing a blank page (in such instances, I just have to format it as Hidden). -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA http://word.mvps.org "bubbakittee" wrote in message ... Does anyone have guidelines or "best practices" regarding the use of Word's paragraph spacing capabilities ?? For example, suppose I want 12 points of space in between any given pair of consecutive "body" paragraphs. How should I define my "body" style ? Should I use: (1) 12 points before and zero points after, or (2) Zero points before and 12 after, or (3) 6 points before and 6 after (4) Something else It seems to me that #3 works best. The only downside is that the 6 pts of "space before" prevents me from putting headings close to my body paragraphs (which I sometimes want to do). I have tried #2, also, and it seems to create a lot of extra work with spacing around figures, tables, and bulleted lists. For your amusement ... many years ago, I edited some docs from the documentation group at Microsoft. Their approach was to put in an extra carriage return, and then adjust its height. I hope that's not the best approach these days. thanks bk |
#3
Posted to microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs
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Spacing recommendations
Don't ever base usage on documents from Microsoft; most Softies have no idea how to use Word. I've taught many MS grandmothers to suck eggs, including some in the Office User Assistance ("Help") department. That said, a lot of the oldest templates I have, based on letter templates that shipped with Word 2.0, have #3 spacing (6 points Before and After), and this does have its points. As a rule, I prefer using Spacing After (for the mentioned reasons having to do with headings), and you'll note that the built-in Body Text style has just 6 points After. It's rarely necessary to have a full 12 points between paragraphs of 12-point text, IMO. If you format lists with no Spacing Before (depending on the 6 points from the Body Text) and 6 points After, then enable "Don't add space between paragraphs of the same style," you can have tightly spaced lists and still have 6 points After. No matter what you do, you'll sometimes have to fudge. I have a Body Text Space Before style, with 12 points Spacing Before, that I use in fiction where the author wants to indicate a break, or after tables where I need extra space, etc. I have Body Text set as the following style. And sometimes you'll just have to apply direct formatting to get a desired effect. I can usually make do without empty paragraphs EXCEPT around TOCs. Here they are vital because the "empty paragraph" that appears to be below the TOC is actually inside the TOC field, and you can't insert a page break, a second TOC, or anything else in that paragraph without making it part of the TOC. This can be incredibly frustrating, especially when the TOC completely fills the page and the empty paragraph is forcing a blank page (in such instances, I just have to format it as Hidden). -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA http://word.mvps.org "bubbakittee" wrote in message ... Does anyone have guidelines or "best practices" regarding the use of Word's paragraph spacing capabilities ?? For example, suppose I want 12 points of space in between any given pair of consecutive "body" paragraphs. How should I define my "body" style ? Should I use: (1) 12 points before and zero points after, or (2) Zero points before and 12 after, or (3) 6 points before and 6 after (4) Something else It seems to me that #3 works best. The only downside is that the 6 pts of "space before" prevents me from putting headings close to my body paragraphs (which I sometimes want to do). I have tried #2, also, and it seems to create a lot of extra work with spacing around figures, tables, and bulleted lists. For your amusement ... many years ago, I edited some docs from the documentation group at Microsoft. Their approach was to put in an extra carriage return, and then adjust its height. I hope that's not the best approach these days. thanks bk |
#4
Posted to microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs
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Spacing recommendations
I can't seem to reply to your reply to my reply (I get an error message
about a malformed header), so I'm replying to this one instead: Yes, I'm pretty sure lists were what the developers had in mind with the "Don't add space" setting. In Word 2007, the List Paragraph style has this enabled by default. I usually end up with space between list items anyway. Tightly spaced lists are fine for bulleted lists where no item is more than one line long. Once you start having runover lines, it seems to look better with at least some space beween items. -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA http://word.mvps.org "bubbakittee" wrote in message ... Does anyone have guidelines or "best practices" regarding the use of Word's paragraph spacing capabilities ?? For example, suppose I want 12 points of space in between any given pair of consecutive "body" paragraphs. How should I define my "body" style ? Should I use: (1) 12 points before and zero points after, or (2) Zero points before and 12 after, or (3) 6 points before and 6 after (4) Something else It seems to me that #3 works best. The only downside is that the 6 pts of "space before" prevents me from putting headings close to my body paragraphs (which I sometimes want to do). I have tried #2, also, and it seems to create a lot of extra work with spacing around figures, tables, and bulleted lists. For your amusement ... many years ago, I edited some docs from the documentation group at Microsoft. Their approach was to put in an extra carriage return, and then adjust its height. I hope that's not the best approach these days. thanks bk |
#5
Posted to microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs
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Spacing recommendations
I can't seem to reply to your reply to my reply (I get an error message
about a malformed header), so I'm replying to this one instead: Yes, I'm pretty sure lists were what the developers had in mind with the "Don't add space" setting. In Word 2007, the List Paragraph style has this enabled by default. I usually end up with space between list items anyway. Tightly spaced lists are fine for bulleted lists where no item is more than one line long. Once you start having runover lines, it seems to look better with at least some space beween items. -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA http://word.mvps.org "bubbakittee" wrote in message ... Does anyone have guidelines or "best practices" regarding the use of Word's paragraph spacing capabilities ?? For example, suppose I want 12 points of space in between any given pair of consecutive "body" paragraphs. How should I define my "body" style ? Should I use: (1) 12 points before and zero points after, or (2) Zero points before and 12 after, or (3) 6 points before and 6 after (4) Something else It seems to me that #3 works best. The only downside is that the 6 pts of "space before" prevents me from putting headings close to my body paragraphs (which I sometimes want to do). I have tried #2, also, and it seems to create a lot of extra work with spacing around figures, tables, and bulleted lists. For your amusement ... many years ago, I edited some docs from the documentation group at Microsoft. Their approach was to put in an extra carriage return, and then adjust its height. I hope that's not the best approach these days. thanks bk |
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