RE: Question regarding styles

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Rachael Lininger [mailto:techwhirl -at- earthlink -dot- net]

> When I make styles, I usually use the "space before" setting 
> to separate elements, not the "space after." I'll add the 
> "space after" for headings that need the extra whitespace, 
> but not normal text. Lately, though, I've been working with 
> documents that tend to use the "space after" setting exclusively.
> 
> Is there a reason for this? Have I always been doing it 
> wrong? Are there advantages one way or the other? I sometimes 
> have trouble visuallizing how a change to style settings will 
> propagate through an entire document and interact with other 
> elements, so a general rule of thumb might be helpful. If 
> there is one.

You said "styles", so I suppose you are using Word rather 
than FrameMaker, so that might imply some difference that 
makes my my experience with FrameMaker inapplicable. 
Nevertheless, here it is:

If I specify a space-before, it works just as well as a 
space after, in most situations. However, when a paragraph 
lands at the top of a page, the "space-before" causes it 
to start that much lower on the page. This is not a big 
deal except when you get paragraphs of different height and 
spacing on adjacent pages. Then, two facing pages will 
fail to line up at their top margins. If all spacing is 
accomplished by space-after, then all paragraphs try to 
line up at the very top of each column.

I'm sure there were other reasons, and that one has 
probably gone out the window with recent FM releases, 
but I'm a creature of habit.   :-)
YWMMD (Your Word Mileage May Differ)

/kevin