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Did anyone mention that empty paragraphs can mess up pagination? I think
that recent editions of Word suppress the empty paragraphs at the top of the
page, but I have been able to see that somebody used empty paragraphs
because the top margin would change when I looked at a printed document.
Also page breaks would sometimes be in strange places, like just *after* a
heading because somebody wanted more space between headings and paragraphs.
I remove all empty paragraphs when I get a document to edit. I don't like
that pagination gets mess up. I also don't like that the empty paragraphs
tend to have different styles based on the location of the cursor when the
paragraph was inserted. I really don't like that when I change a style,
those empty paragraphs stick out and cause unpleasant and unnecessary gaps.
Additionally, it is annoying to have to look for these things to see if they
are causing problems and delete them if the convention is retained or run a
replace to delete them all. People who use empty paragraphs do not seem as
concerned about layout as I do. I do not use empty paragraphs primarily
because I want to control pagination and paragraph spacing with styles,
format, and layout options. Empty paragraphs interefere with all three of
these.
Lauren
> -----Original Message-----
> From: techwr-l-bounces+lt34=csus -dot- edu -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> [mailto:techwr-l-bounces+lt34=csus -dot- edu -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On
> Behalf Of Shannon Wade
> Sent: Wednesday, February 28, 2007 6:25 AM
> To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> Subject: (no subject)
>
> Hello all. Here's what I posted (via Michelle) yesterday:
>
> OK, here's an interesting one. I've done some looking in the
> archives and find nothing that's exactly what I want. I'm
> wondering if anyone has heard about using the "shift + enter"
> option to reduce the number of paragraph marks appearing in a
> document. I can find all kinds of information telling me that
> I shouldn't have paragraph marks with no attached text, but
> nothing that tells me what happens if I do have them.
> So what does happen? I know that corruption is often stored
> in paragraph marks, but everything I find talks about that
> occuring in the final paragraph mark of a document. Can
> anyone shed some light on this? I get the digest version, so
> if I don't respond immediately, please accept my apologies.
>
> What I'm trying to do is to get some information on why it
> might benefit me to remove so-called "blank" paragraph marks
> from my document. I have one co-worker that says her research
> indicates it reduces corruption. I have another co-worker
> that says our use of styles (something we ARE NOT going to
> give up) is what causes the corruption. All my research
> indicates that, yes, paragraph marks do tend to hold the
> corrupt information. However, everything I read says that it
> is usually the final paragraph mark that causes the problem.
> But I also read that you should not have blank paragraphs.
> Can anyone tell me why I shouldn't have blank paragraphs or
> shed ANY light on the other issue?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Shannon
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printed documentation. Features include single source authoring, team authoring,
Web-based technology, and PDF output. http://www.DocToHelp.com/TechwrlList
Now shipping: Help & Manual 4 with RoboHelp(r) import! New editor,
full Unicode support. Create help files, web-based help and PDF in up
to 106 languages with Help & Manual: http://www.helpandmanual.com
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