Scaling down a document?

Subject: Scaling down a document?
From: Geoff Hart <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 2004 10:52:36 -0400


New Tech Writer wondered: <<My first assignment is to update and then produce a smaller version of a user guide that is mostly text and some screen caps. The original guide is in letter size. If I want to produce both a new letter size and a smaller version (like A5) - is it ok to create a letter size version and scale down the result for the smaller user guide?>>

The problem with a solution based solely on scaling is that either the initial text will be too large for easy reading, or the reduced size will be too small. The simplest and most effective solution is to pick a series of font sizes that will work equally well at both paper sizes, and design a layout that will reflow the text to accomodate the changed paper size. For ease of maintenance, this suggests a free-flowing layout in which graphics move along with their associated text rather than one in which the graphics are anchored to the page.

You'll have to do some manual revision of the layout, since the page breaks will fall differently, but that's life.

--Geoff Hart ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca
(try geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com if you don't get a reply)


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References:
scaling down a document?: From: New Tech Writer

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