Take your pick: Crawling naked through broken glass or doing a layout in Word
Michael Brady
On what gnikcuf planet does Word make sense? I just used the bulleted list feature, which made several paragraphs a bulleted list. That worked -- except when Word bulletized the list, it changed from justified to FL/RR. Huh? So I fixed that, but the indents weren't far enough (it was a bulleted list under another bulleted list item), so I clicked on the "Indent further" button.
Bingo, MFWurd indented it further ... and changed the bullets into f*cking numbers! Who the f*ck's in charge, me or some programmer in Redmond?
Try changing page numbers, or even inserting them, and then try changing them from arabic to roman!
Or inserting a full-page PDF as an image. Does it come in at ... oh ... full size? Of course not. Why do it the reasonable way? The image is imported at about 85% and God only knows how to reposition it. Well, I could drag it with the selection cursor, but that's as tricky as grabbing eels. I'm left to double click on the frame to open the options, tab here, tab there, jeez... And of the three PDFs, Word garbled up two of them (simply omitting the continent of Africa in a vector graphic, but leaving Madagascar!). So I had to JPEG those two pages.
IHFW (hint: the H stands for Hate)
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Michael Brady
www.michaelbradydesign.com/Blog/ | mich...@michaelbradydesign.com
www.twitter.com/typehuile | www.linkedin.com/in/typehuile | www.facebook.com/typehuile
"Thinking Like a Designer" at https://www.createspace.com/3462255 or http://snipurl.com/z43se
William Adams
> I just used the bulleted list feature, which made several paragraphs a bulleted list. That worked -- except when Word bulletized the list, it changed from justified to FL/RR. Huh? So I fixed that, but the indents weren't far enough (it was a bulleted list under another bulleted list item), so I clicked on the "Indent further" button.
>
> Bingo, MFWurd indented it further ... and changed the bullets into ... numbers! Who ...'s in charge, me or some programmer in Redmond?
_Never_, _ever_ use local formatting in Word if there is any sort of other option --- just make a new style and apply that.
William
--
William Adams
senior graphic designer
Fry Communications
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
Jules Siegel
> On what gnikcuf planet does Word make sense? I just used the bulleted list feature, which made several paragraphs a bulleted list. That worked -- except when Word bulletized the list, it changed from justified to FL/RR. Huh? So I fixed that, but the indents weren't far enough (it was a bulleted list under another bulleted list item), so I clicked on the "Indent further" button.
>
are doing it like one of the people you hate. Stop blaming Word and use the
correct process.
--
JULES SIEGEL http://www.moronia.us/
"If it ain't fixed, don't broke it."
Newsroom-l, news and issues for journalists
http://www.newsroom-l.net/
Jules Siegel
> one of the bullet-in bullet list styles
built-in
Robert Severn
> --
> you are subscribed to "InDesign talk" on Google Groups, to post: send email to indesi...@googlegroups.com, to unsubscribe: send email to indesign-tal...@googlegroups.com, for more options visit http://groups.google.com/group/indesign-talk
>
Bob
Robert K Severn
Severn Associates
Marketing Services
rse...@severnet.com
"Make a deal with the devil, and you're the junior partner"
Dick Armey
Roy McCoy
> I need drugs and commiseration.
Or maybe you need the handy-dandy solution I've found to all my Word problems, which at least on the basis of my own experience I can recommend to others without hesitation for at least a trial. And that is, whenever you have something in Word and whatever it is, import it into InDesign and deal with it there. Yes, you have to redo certain things and there are problems. But they're InDesign problems, which I've consistently found to be of an utterly different nature than Word problems.
Take it or leave it. It works for me.
The only thing I'm going into Word for these days is to sort on a column, and right now I'm thinking I don't even need it for that. There may be a way to do it without even having to mess with the text (a script or plug-in or something), but I can always copy or move the column I want to sort on to make it leftmost, convert it to text and then use the SortParagraphs sample script to get my sort. It may remain quicker to do it in Word, but it's a nice thought nonetheless.
Roy
Michael_Brady
> Michael B. wrote:
> > I need drugs and commiseration.
>
> Or maybe you need the handy-dandy solution I've found to all my Word problems, which at least on the basis of my own experience I can recommend to others without hesitation for at least a trial. And that is, whenever you have something in Word and whatever it is, import it into InDesign and deal with it there. Yes, you have to redo certain things and there are problems. But they're InDesign problems, which I've consistently found to be of an utterly different nature than Word problems.
The job started as a Word file that the client wanted edited and laid
out as a book. I used MSW to edit and then took it into ID to lay
out. (BTW, the project was a "2 -fer" as in 2 documents totaling 2
hundred pages finished in 2 weeks. Yowza!)
Then at the end, the client asked me to give him the text in Word so
his client, the ultimate recipient, could use it to copy and paste,
but he wanted it to resemble the original with all the edits. Hence,
my trip with Dante into Hell.
BTW, Jules. Why does Word have two ways to do something, the slapdash
way with weird rules (for secretaries, I suppose, who are by
definition hapless) and the "right" way for the cognoscenti? I don't
blame Word for doing it a different way, but for devising a UI that is
incomprehensibly non-intuitive. I tried to apply styles (using both
the style box at the upper left and the Formatting palette). I had to
click on the style name 3, 4, 6 times before I just gave up. Yet on
the very next page, I could click on the same style name and it would
work. You tell me, where's the logic in that? Where's the user-
friendliness? Where's the "improved efficiency"?
Robert Severn
Hank
wealth of real world Word info:
http://word.mvps.org/
I'm often forced by various corporate realities/limitations/narrow-
mindedness/stupidity (take your pick) to struggle with Word as a
"publlshing" platform. Going back and forth between Word and ID
introduces the need to engage in cleaning up both repeatedly.
The mvps site often leads me to solutions. There's a Mac and a PC
page. One thing I've done is to customize a formatting palette with
often-used commands that are other wise deeply buried in layers of
dialogs.
Wordplay Consulting kor...@wp-consulting.com
Strategic Information Design
Coauthor of "How to Communicate Technical Information"
—called the "Bible" of technical communication
Jules Siegel
> I'm often forced by various corporate realities/limitations/narrow-
> mindedness/stupidity (take your pick) to struggle with Word as a
> "publlshing" platform.
adequate publishing platform, but is has its limitations. It's not a layout
application. To do a book the easy way, you use the Word built-in styles and
adjust them to best fit your taste. The interface can be baffling, but so can
InDesign.
As many of you will recall, I did a book-length legal work a few months ago in
Word 2007. I used Bembo instead of my preferred Minion because I have all the
Bembo alternate sets. I used ID for the index because it would have taken me too
much time to learn how to format it in Word. I was very happy with the result
and so was the client.
I find the constant carping about Word annoying. Like many others here, I have
problems using Illustrator, mainly because I am unfamiliar with it. I do my
vector designs in Corel and export them to Illustrator for use in InDesign. I do
not constantly complain about it and deride it with insulting names. I think it
would be only civil of the Word haters to leave the sneers out when asking for
advice, especially when ignorance and poor professional policies are the cause
of your problems, not the inadequacy of the application.
Andrew Brown
We wouldn't carp about it if we didn't have to use it, even if our use
is limited to the few seconds that it takes to place a customer's Word
file in ID, the following hours being spent in ID, not in Word,
repairing the damage.
One of the problems with Word is that there are so few real-life
parallels that can be produced, it is uniquely out of place, uniquely
inappropriate. If surgeons used a hammer and chisel during heart
surgery, we would certainly carp about them as we carp about Word. If
our best cars were Trabants, we would also carp. If our restaurants
offered up dishes rescued from the city dump, we would carp briefly
before dying...
Perhaps political life offers the best parallel. We elected Bush,
Blair and Berlusconi, so why should we not be happy with Word?
AB
Jules Siegel
> We wouldn't carp about it if we didn't have to use it, even if our use is
> limited to the few seconds that it takes to place a customer's Word file in
> ID, the following hours being spent in ID, not in Word, repairing the damage.
Repair the damage in Word. There are many techniques for making the job easier.
It's not Word's fault that your clients give you lousy files. Anne-Marie
Concepci�n has several articles and tutorials on this.
Roy McCoy
Word can be used as an adequate publishing platform, but is has its limitations. It's not a layout application. To do a book the easy way, you use the Word built-in styles and adjust them to best fit your taste. The interface can be baffling, but so can InDesign.
Jules Siegel
> So, yes, you could do a straight, no-layout book with Word in 1987 and you
> still can now - but I would never want to do that even if I can. I think
> InDesign has usable default styles too (I don't know, I don't keep them), and
> whatever ease Word's built-in styles might provide is generally, I'm quite
> sure, offset by a mass of problems and clunkinesses that many of us rightfully
> don't like, and even - rightfully or not - despise.
The point is that you use it when it's the best tool for the job. InDesign can't
handle some jobs that Word does beautifully, such as my aforementioned book of
legal citations.
It's also, in my opinion, the best tool for correcting badly done Word files.
Roy McCoy
> The point is that you use it when it's the best tool for the job. InDesign can't handle some jobs that Word does beautifully, such as my aforementioned book of legal citations.
>
> It's also, in my opinion, the best tool for correcting badly done Word files.
Okay, this may be the case. Whether it is or isn't, I'm just glad I don't ever have to use it to get anything to press.
But I just recently had a badly done Word file, come to think of it.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1107821/%20%20Temp/iku10fin.doc
Isn't this perhaps the kind of file you're referring to? I considered leaving it in Word, sure. But this time it took me less than a minute to decide to bring it into ID and whip it out there, and I don't regret the decision in the slightest.
Roy
Jules Siegel
> Isn't this perhaps the kind of file you're referring to? I considered leaving it in Word, sure. But this time it took me less than a minute to decide to bring it into ID and whip it out there, and I don't regret the decision in the slightest.
for answers. All I can say that I have never had any problems placing a properly
prepared Word file in inDesign. I prefer Word for word processing functions.
It's what I use when I write. Unless there's some reason not to, I use Word to
massage a file, and InDesign to lay it out. I don't have an emotional attachment
to either one. It's strictly a professional decision. I charge my clients for
the work, no matter how I do it. If they give me files that require a lot of
cleaning up, they pay for it. Since Word is the most common file, I've learned
to use to its best advantage.
I really don't understand all the complaining.
Roy McCoy
> I really don't understand all the complaining.
I think I may. You likely simply became accustomed to Word features in a way that others of us never did. There was a point where I started doing nearly everything in PageMaker, and after that point it was generally exasperating when I went back to Word. It really is clunky - those horrible panels and incomplete, unadjustable dropdown menus, for example. (My memory is vague on this, thankfully.) You just don't see it because you're so used to it.
Roy
Jules Siegel
> You just don't see it because you're so used to it.
neurotic about it -- unlike the rest of my life.
Enid Gleich
The Trabant car
Show-cased Trabant 601, 1963
• What's the best feature of a Trabant?: There's a heater at the back to keep your hands warm when you're pushing it.
• A West German visitor is driving a Mercedes through East Germany on a rainy night when his windshield wipers stop working. He takes it to an East German mechanic, who tells him there are no Mercedes windshield wiper motors in the GDR, but he will do his best to fix it. When the businessman returns the next day, to his surprise the windshield wipers are working perfectly. "How did you find a Mercedes windshield wiper motor in the East?" he asks the mechanic. "We didn't," replies the mechanic, "We used the engine of a Trabant."
Enid
Amy Rothstein
-- An example of annoyances that draw complaints, is that apparently there are two ways to make bullets, you imply one of them is done by those in the know. Which one is that? Robert says he used the bulleted list feature. What did he do wrong?
More to the point, why does Word have so many options that are NOT "the correct process" ??
Jules Siegel
> More to the point, why does Word have so many options that are NOT "the correct process"
Why does InDesign?
It's not a question of the correct process in some absolute sense, but the one
that is appropriate to the job at hand. It's aimed at an immense base of users,
some of whom are using it for very simple tasks such as writing letters. Others
are presumably professionals who are creating long, structured documents. Turn
one of your simpleton clients loose in InDesign and you'll wind up with similar
problems, such as random use of styles and local formatting, zillions of text
boxes and so on.
Why does InDesign have a truncated back-saving option? Word 2007 can back-save
files to formats that can be read directly by Word 6 and earlier, as well as by
just about other any word processing application, with all formatting intact and
editable, in all of the world's principal languages and platforms.
I find the discussion, frankly, ridiculous. A lot of you are working on
supposedly state-of-the-art, high-powered Macs, which have cranky operating
systems, nasty font handling quirks and hair-pulling cross-platform issues. I
have to deal with problems when I get my Mac clients' files. They send me PDFs
(produced by some kind of built-in operating system application, I gather), that
crash and burn when I try to extract their contents, among other problems. I am
accustomed to their failings and I do not complain (although I will admit to
snidely telling them to get a PC when they complain). I just work with them to
get the job done.
Someone once observed that if we define normal as 2+2=4, the psychotic will say
something not very useful such as apples plus bananas equal testicles, while the
neurotic will say, yes, I know 2+2=4 but I can't STAND it. Word's quirks are
irrelevant. All applications have quirks. Some of them are the object of
condescending sneers (Windows), while others are blithely accepted as cute
eccentricities (Macintosh). It's your job as a graphic designer to get the job
down and get paid for it, not to feel superior when the truth is you can't put
in the time, effort and intelligence to solve occasionally challenging problems.
Amy Rothstein
This was not a rhetorical question.
Jules Siegel
> -- An example of annoyances that draw complaints, is that apparently there are two ways to make bullets, you imply one of them is done by those in the know.
Not in the know. This is elementary word processing and layout procedure. Anyone
who uses InDesign will understand it. It works in Word much the same way it does
in InDesign. It's somewhat like selecting a series of paragraphs in InDesign and
applying local bullet formatting using the Bullets and Numbering option in the
Paragraph dialog box. I would have to do a comparison test to see the
differences, such as which additional paragraph attributes are changed or
retained. But the idea is the same.
> Which one is that? Robert
Michael
> says he used the bulleted list feature.
I'd have to see it, but I presume he used the Bullets icon on the ribbon bar and
then the Indent More icon.
> What did he do wrong?
It depends on the situation. Using the ribbon bar icon to make bullets is
suitable for short documents such as letters, or occasionally in longer
unstructured documents with very simple formatting. It's a shortcut. It's not a
proper practice in lengthy, structured documents with repetitive paragraph
styles and sophisticated formatting. It's not a good idea to apply ribbon bar
paragraph formatting -- such as indents, numbering and bullets -- more than once
to the same text, as each option has its own indent scheme, among other effects,
and they can interact in unanticipated ways.
Michael Brady
On Jul 10, 2011, at 11:14 PM, Jules Siegel wrote:
> Not in the know. This is elementary word processing and layout procedure. Anyone who uses InDesign will understand it. It works in Word much the same way it does in InDesign. It's somewhat like selecting a series of paragraphs in InDesign and applying local bullet formatting using the Bullets and Numbering option in the Paragraph dialog box. I would have to do a comparison test to see the differences, such as which additional paragraph attributes are changed or retained. But the idea is the same.
>
>> Which one is that? Robert
>
> Michael
>
>> says he used the bulleted list feature.
>
> I'd have to see it, but I presume he used the Bullets icon on the ribbon bar and then the Indent More icon.
>
>> What did he do wrong?
>
> It depends on the situation. Using the ribbon bar icon to make bullets is suitable for short documents such as letters, or occasionally in longer unstructured documents with very simple formatting. It's a shortcut. It's not a proper practice in lengthy, structured documents with repetitive paragraph styles and sophisticated formatting. It's not a good idea to apply ribbon bar paragraph formatting -- such as indents, numbering and bullets -- more than once to the same text, as each option has its own indent scheme, among other effects, and they can interact in unanticipated ways.
I don't doubt that Word has lots of power and many useful features. It also has an absolutely diabolical interface. ("Diabolical" = throwing apart, not satanic, but that works for me, too).
Why is the bulleted list I create with the bullet icon on the ribbon or in the Formatting palette *different* from a bulleted list style? Apparently the MSW engineers set it up that way, and it's beyond my comprehension why they chose to do that. It does nothing more than frustrate users. "It is not a good idea to apply the ribbon formatting more than once, etc." is not the answer and explanation-- but it does point to the problem.
The first time I encountered some of this planned frustration came way back in the late 90s when I tried to change MFW's preset default to create superscript ordinals. I dislike them, so I went into AutoFormat and unchecked the option, okayed the box, and returned to typing. Bam! Another superscript ordinal. Whaaa? So I opened the AutoFormat dialog box to verify that the option was unchecked (it was). Then I noticed another tab, AutoFormatAsYouType. Hmmmmmm. Do you think ..? Nah, they wouldn't. But I checked anyway. I opened that tab and damned if the option for superscript ordinals was checked. I looked back at AutoFormat and it was not checked.
What gnikcuf programmer did that? Who on earth besides some pocket-protector person would put the same user option in two places and NOT LINK THEM, so that if you want to change it, you have to do it twice! That's beyond stupid.
That's what I'm talking about. I'm not complaining about why they put a command in one menu rather than another.
Using normal, everyday logic and intuitional inferences as practiced by an ostensibly smart person with many years of layout experience (that would be me), the user should have a 'reasonable expectation' that there is a consistency and uniformity of certain operations.
Not in Wurd. Click on the bullet list icon and the justification changes? Click to indent further and the bullet changes? The appearance of a bulleted list is different if I use different preset ways to create a bulleted paragraph makes NO sense.
Here's another thing. Try assigning a keyboard command to any one specific option in the Change Case dialog box. Can't do it. I use four in ID: sentence, title, all l.c., and all caps. Can't do that in MFW.
Applying styles is never easy. The pull-down menu at the upper list only displays five or six at a time, and the Formatting palette isn't much better. I often use 30, 40, or more in an ID file. I don't even try in Word.
Maybe the interface has improved since Mac Word 2004. I have to use MFW when I edit mss for clients, and then there's the post-partum terror I go through every now and then when the client asks to get the text back in Word to use later. In the case that drove me nuts, this was made clear from the beginning.
By the way, the comments on this Forum about AcroX deal with the very same issue: making really dumb decisions about the UI, not about the kinds of things Acro can do. If the company (Adobe or MS) is going to tout the "improved efficiency" of the newest versions don't f*** up the UI so that well-seasoned users scratch their heads in confusion and annoyance.
Jules Siegel
> What gnikcuf programmer did that? Who on earth besides some pocket-protector person would put the same user option in two places and NOT LINK THEM, so that if you want to change it, you have to do it twice! That's beyond stupid.
Large applications are programmed by groups of people who often have conflicting
goals and lots of legacy baggage to deal with. Features get added and someone
forgets a link. It's not stupidity, but a statistical function that is affected
by management style. If you're serious about understanding this, please read
"Why Things Don't Work," <http://cafecancun.com/bookarts/dontwork.shtml> my last
published Playboy article. I'd also suggest "The Bug" by Ellen Ullman
<http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/05/25/RV188798.DTL>
> That's what I'm talking about. I'm not complaining about why they put a command in one menu rather than another.
Why aren't you as angry at In-DUH-sine?
> Using normal, everyday logic and intuitional inferences as practiced by an ostensibly smart person with many years of layout experience (that would be me), the user should have a 'reasonable expectation' that there is a consistency and uniformity of certain operations.
Yes, of course. A very noble goal. In the real world, however, this is not
always the case. That's why people consult help, read manuals, buy books, take
courses, participate in lists and forums, do independent research and educate
themselves about the quirks of their daily work tools.
There's a larger issue, though, the idea that everything must be effortless,
intuitive and fun.
During the early development of the missile program, the generals decided that
any cook and baker should be able to access the computer controls and be able to
launch an attack. They wanted them to be able to diagnose any problem through an
online help system and dispense with written manuals altogether. This turned out
not to be feasible. They did do printed manuals as well.
I always used to read the manuals cover-to-cover for my applications. I never
subscribed to the just do it theory of computer use. I expect a program to have
a learning curve and if I need it, I do what it takes to master its idiosyncrasies.
Hank
and page layout is well-taken. And I agree that carping is useless.
However my experience of Word is that of someone who not only does
page layout for books, newsletters, advertisements, etc. but who
develops documentation through all stages including publication and
revision.
My experience with Word goes back to its first appearance as a Mac app
and I have used it nearly every day since then. It was the page layout
and publishing platform for Apple (and Claris as long as it was
around) used for all end user documentation. As a contractor I wrote
and formatted UGs for many Apple apps between 1986 and 1990. I had
very few problems because we had a well-designed template and a formal
usage guide for it. Most importantly, throughout the various drafts
and revisions, the files were touched only by experienced Word users
who did not introduce any problems.
In my recent experience, say the past 10 years, that has rarely been
the case. For very good reasons, Word has developed into a tool for
people who can make do with the built-in styles and features. With few
exceptions these folks are those who review and comment on documents
in development. Most of them "know" how to use Word and have no
interest in learning any more. So any document that passes through
their hands invariably gets garbled to some extent. I clean up a
document returned to me so that I can work on it, then it gets garbled
again. And again. For a 200-300 page document this exercise is not
trivial. So yes, the problem is ignorance.
I've developed a quick and dirty Word training for these folks and
have had some success with changing the mindset of a number of them
with whom I need to work on an ongoing basis. For the others I give
them PDFs to review and comment on.
So the level of frustration many of us have experienced has to do not
only with users, but with the attitude Microsoft cultivates in Word
users. And the way what is built-in tends to override, at the oddest
moments, what has been carefully customized.
Wordplay Consulting kor...@wp-consulting.com
Strategic Information Design
Coauthor of "How to Communicate Technical Information"
—called the "Bible" of technical communication
Jules Siegel
> So the level of frustration many of us have experienced has to do not
> only with users, but with the attitude Microsoft cultivates in Word
> users. And the way what is built-in tends to override, at the oddest
> moments, what has been carefully customized.
>
with long histories suffer from a kind of moebius effect. They get their
multitudinous orifices and channel and tentacles into loops so complex that
weird stuff happens. I have never really needed any more than Word 6 for my own
work, but I have to deal with clients' files.
Another reading suggestion: A Subway Called Moebius by A. J. Deutsch, which I
just learned inspired a movie called Moebius. I read it in Astounding Science
Fiction, December, 1950. It was my introduction to topology, which is about the
inner life of surfaces.
We know it's an institutional property because we see it happening in Acrobat X.
I'm sure others can name their own favorite examples. In my opinion, the pace of
development is being driven by Wall Street's demand for short-term profits and
capital appreciation. The result is the Dilbertization of the intellectual
workspace.
--
JULES SIEGEL http://www.moronia.us/
Valter Viglietti - Frame Studio
>> That's what I'm talking about. I'm not complaining about why they put a
>> command in one menu rather than another.
>
> Why aren't you as angry at In-DUH-sine?
And don't even get us started on Illustrator UI... ;-D
(oh my oh my...)
C F Majors
--
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--
Carol Majors / Publications unltd
Raleigh NC
. . . . . . . . . . . .