chuq@plaid.UUCP (05/05/87)
From: munnari!anucsd.oz!rim%csadfa.OZ@seismo.CSS.GOV (Robert I. McKay) Date: 4 May 87 08:29:56 GMT Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, University College, UNSW, ADFA, Canberrra, Australia in article <.17579@sun.uucp>, dirk@words (Dirk van Nouhuys) says: > > Hyphenation: More and more technical documents are turning to wide, > ragged-right pages. There > is no need for hyphenation in this context. No hyphenation is certainly > better than the > weird hyphenation troff some times gives us. Hyphenation is sometimes > confusing in a context like LISP where variable names contain hyphens. > This may be correct, but is a matter for deep regret, not an excuse for avoiding the issue. There is a very good reason for the traditional 50-70 characters per line justified text tradition: it improves readability! In justified text, the brain has little difficulty in finding the start of the next line: it always bears a constant spatial relationship to the end of the previous one. The limit of 50-70 characters per line .allows for skim reading - just moving the eyes vertically, there is usually sufficient information within the focal range to get the overall sense of the material .in concentrated reading, reduces the likelihood of skipping or rereading lines, since the allowable angular error in retrace is larger. Thus wider columns require deeper leading, and so actually require more paper for the same level of readability than narrow columns. This brings up a wider issue: the DESIRABILITY of desktop publishing. Over the past couple of years of the desktop revolution, documents have become .prettier - the availability of good tools has allowed everyman to let loose his artistic flair, and the results have often been impressive - most people seem to have some talent for layout. .but far less readable - the rules for readability, while well understood in a tradition that has evolved over the last 500 years, don't seem to be particularly obvious to everyman (and an honest assessment would indicate that the first 50 years or so of the printing revolution produced some pretty horrible grunge too, though that tends to be clouded by the veneration which surrounds the 'early masters') What should be done about it? Well, it's probably too late to revert to the requirement for a five year apprenticeship before being let loose on desktop publishing. And it's probably too much to hope that everyman will read one of the great works on typography before commencing. Perhaps the solution is a package-integrated guardian of style: a system that looks over one's shoulder and in a gently chiding tone reminds one of the great principle of typography one is intent on breaking. It seems an ideal application for an expert system. Any takers? A limited bibliography: Bland, D 'Introduction to Typography', Faber & Faber, London, 1945 Jennett, S 'The Making of Books', Faber & Faber, London 1951 Morison, S 'First Principles of Typography', 2nd ed, Cambridge 1967 Updike, D B 'Printing Types, Their History, Forms & Use' Harvard, 1937 and Burt, Sir C. 'A Psychological Study of Typography', Cambridge 1959 (he of the faked results, but so far as I know this particular piece of work has not been criticised). ------------------------------- Submissions to: desktop%plaid@sun.com Administrivia to: desktop-request%plaid@sun.com Chuq Von Rospach chuq@sun.COM [I don't read flames] There is no statute of limitations on stupidity