'Getting You Started' guide to
Pagemaker 6.5

Section 7      Bullets and numbering, Drop Capitals and Table of Contents

Bullets and numbering

This 'Plug-In' allows you to add 'bullets' or numbers to selected paragraphs in the text. Use it as follows:

1. Start from 'Layout view' (ie. not 'Story Editor').
2. Using the 'Text' tool, click in the first paragraph to which you want to add the bullets/numbers.
3. Select 'Utilities', 'Plug-Ins' and 'Bullets & numbering'.
4. Choose whether you want to add bullets/numbers to every paragraph, a certain number of paragraphs, all paragraphs with a certain style, or selected (highlighted) paragraphs.
5. For bullets, choose the type of bullet you want. If the selection offered does not appeal to you, click on 'Edit', and choose from the entire character set (or another set).
6. For numbers, click on 'Numbers' and complete the dialogue box which appears. The style of numbering can be chosen, and the separator, ie. the character which appears after the number.
7. Then click 'OK' (or 'Remove' to remove previously placed bullets/numbers).
8. A bullet/number followed by a tab is added to each paragraph within the selected range.

Note that once bullets/numbers are added, they become an ordinary part of the paragraph text. They are not automatically attached to the paragraph style, so even if you add bullets to every paragraph with the style 'Subhead', any paragraphs subsequently created with that style will not have a bullet. If you then repeat the exercise without first removing the bullets on the old paragraphs, all the old paragraphs will end up with two bullets!

• Hint: To get bulleted paragraphs looking like this, set up the paragraph so that the indent for the first line is different to the standard left indent eg. left indent = 10, first indent = -10. This is best done using a paragraph style. Then apply the bullets.

Exercise

Open the file created earlier containing the text from guide.txt. Examine the text in the file, and observe where the addition of bullets or numbering would improve readability. Use the 'Bullets and numbering' feature to add bullets or numbering to these paragraphs.

Drop Capitals

nother embellishment much beloved by desktop and traditional publishers alike is the drop capital, as shown at the beginning of this paragraph.  To add a drop capital to a paragraph, click with the text tool anywhere in the required paragraph, then select 'Utilities', 'Plug-ins', 'Drop cap'.  Choose how many lines the drop capital is to take up, and click 'Apply'.  Drop capitals can be removed from paragraphs using the same option.

Note that this plug-in changes the indents and other attributes of the paragraph.  If these attributes are subsequently altered manually, the layout will be spoiled.  If the indents, width, font size or other attributes of the paragraph need to be changed, it is best to remove the drop capital, make the changes, and then reapply it.

Table of Contents

PageMaker can create a Table of Contents (TOC) to be placed at the beginning of a document, with the appropriate page numbers against each item.

What goes into the TOC?

Tables of Contents normally consist of the headings from a document, or even a selection of the headings. To make certain headings appear in the TOC, it is best to modify the paragraph styles in which those headings are written. Select 'Type' and 'Define styles', then select the style which applies to the headings that you are interested in. In certain cases you may have to create new styles and apply them to the required headings. Click on 'Edit' and then 'Para...', and check the box marked 'Include in table of contents'. (Some styles eg. 'Headline' already have this box marked.)

When the TOC is eventually created, all paragraphs with this style will appear in it.

Generating the TOC

To actually create the TOC, select 'Utilities' followed by 'Create TOC'. A dialogue box appears which you will have to complete.

After clicking 'OK', the system will create the TOC as a separate story, which you can then place wherever you want it. If you have chosen 'Replace existing table of contents' in the dialogue box, this will happen automatically, otherwise a text placement icon will appear, as for importing text.

Modifying the appearance of the TOC

For every paragraph style in the main document which has the 'Include in TOC' box checked, PageMaker creates a new style for the TOC. For example, a style called 'hanging' in the document will result in a new style called 'TOC hanging', which is only used in the TOC. These new styles determine the appearance of the TOC on the page. To begin with, the TOC styles have the attributes of their 'parent' styles in the main document. So if the 'parent' style is in bold, size 24 and underlined, this is how the entry in the TOC will also appear.  To alter the appearance of the TOC, change the attributes of the TOC styles: select 'Type' and 'Define styles' and select the appropriate TOC style. Then edit the style as for a normal paragraph style.

NB: It is possible to alter the size and shape of the TOC story by altering the indents and tabs, or using the 'Pointer' tool to vary the shape of the text block. But you should be aware that all default TOC styles have a 'right' tab stop hard up against the right margin. If this is not moved you will get some strange results.

Exercise

Open the file created earlier containing the text from guide.txt. Examine the text and decide what headings should appear in a Table of Contents (TOC). Some of these headings may exist already, and some you may have to insert yourself.

Allocate these headings to a style, or styles, which have the 'Include in table of contents' box checked in their definitions. Create these styles if necessary. Generate a blank page at the beginning of the document if you have not already done so and remove any master items from this page, then create the TOC and place it on this page.

By modifying the definitions of the TOC styles, alter the appearance of the TOC to your liking.