RE: Space Before and After? (long)

["Combs, Richard" <richard -dot- combs -at- Polycom -dot- com>]

Catching up on a the last few digests, I noticed that Alan Quirt wrote:
 
> I have always used Space After each body text paragraph 
> style, and both Space Before and Space After for headings, 
> choosing the amount by eye. As a technical person whose 
> documents were a by-product, that was good enough.
> 
> Now I am trying to make technical writing a career, and want 
> to do better.
> Can you offer advice on how to choose good values for 
> paragraph spacing?
> Should it be based mostly on font size? Should it be greater 
> when margins are wider? Do particular kinds of document need 
> special treatment?

Alan, you've gotten some good advice -- and some not so good (promise me
you won't use equal space above and below on all your headings). I want
to address two issues, one not mentioned at all and the other only
touched on: (1) space above vs. space below, and (2) the software you're
using. 

Above vs. below: Dave Chinell acknowledged using a "fallacious
argument... to justify my mysterious, innate desire to design with space
before." I'd like to clear up the mystery, because Dave's desire makes
sense. 

Assuming you agree with Geoff Hart, Damien Braniff, and most of the
civilized world <g> that related items should be closer to each other
than unrelated items, you'll want additional space above headings. To
accomplish this with space below settings only, you'd have to have
special paragraph styles/formats just for use above a heading --
BodyLast, Bullet1Last, etc., etc. And even then, you'd be limited to the
same space above all headings. 

So, it makes far more sense to control the primary spacing variables in
your doc -- the space above headings -- by using the space above
settings of your heading paragraphs. Simplicity and consistency then
suggest sticking with space above for your other paragraphs, too.
Depending on the software you're using, it could be very important; see
below. 

Software: I can only speak to Word and FrameMaker (I've forgotten what
Interleaf, Ventura, and PageMaker do, it's been so long). In FrameMaker,
the space between two paragraphs is the *greater* of the space below the
first and the space above the second. So you can set things up like
this, for instance: 

Heading - 18pt above, 6pt below
<12pt space>
Body - 12pt above, 6pt below 
<12pt space>
Body - 12pt above, 6pt below 
<6pt space>
Bullet - 6pt above, 6pt below
<6pt space>
Bullet - 6pt above, 6pt below
<12pt space>
Body - 12pt above, 6pt below 

But in Word, the space below a paragraph and the space above the
following paragraph are *added together*. So the same setup would result
in: 

Heading - 18pt above, 6pt below
<18pt space>
Body - 12pt above, 6pt below 
<18pt space>
Body - 12pt above, 6pt below 
<12pt space>
Bullet - 6pt above, 6pt below
... 

Probably not what you want. In Word, I strongly recommend using only
space above for all paragraphs. Mixing space above and space below
settings seems inevitably to lead to confusion and unintended
interactions. It gets too complicated having to consider "Will a Heading
3 follow a body indent? Will a bullet follow a Heading 4? What
about...?"

In FM, some people like to set a space below that's the minimum space
they ever want between paragraphs -- the 6pt setting in the example
above, for instance. But the primary setting is the space above, and in
most situations, it governs (because it's equal to or larger than the
space below of the preceding pgf). 

Personally, I leave almost all the space below settings at zero, just as
in Word (I have a few special-purpose exceptions, such as a table anchor
paragraph). If all paragraphs have an appropriate space above, you don't
need a minimum space below. 

HTH!
Richard


------
Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Voyant, a division of Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
richardDOTcombs AT voyanttechDOTcom
303-223-5111
------
rgcombs AT qwestDOTnet
303-777-0436
------








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