Editorial terms – T

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T

tag: see code

template: a pre-formatted document with certain elements in place that allows you to create a layout within certain parameters.

text measure: the length and width of the space on the page allocated to take the text in a layout. Long text measures can affect readability, which is why shorter measures are favoured in magazines and online.

textual mark: the mark in the text that shows the typesetter where to make the correction that is detailed in the corresponding marginal mark.

tint: shading made up of small dots, used in line illustrations or as a background for a text feature, such as a box or panel. It is available in various densities, which are expressed as a percentage of black (black is 100% tint and white is 0%); a 20% tint is darker than one of 5% and less dark than one of 40%.

title case: see maximum capitalisation

title page: a recto page after the half-title page that displays the name of the book and the subtitle, the author(s)/main illustrator(s), any series title, series editor and volume number, and the publisher’s name and logo.

tone: term applied to an image that contains continuous gradations of tone, such as a photograph or an original work of art such as a painting (as opposed to a line illustration).

Track Changes: a tool in Microsoft Word that records amendments suggested, and by whom. Track Changes can be accepted or rejected one by one or wholesale. Make sure you turn Track Changes on after you’ve performed silent corrections. See also revision marking and markup.

trade publishers: companies that produce general-interest fiction and non-fiction books and sell them directly to the public, through general retail trade, such as book shops and online booksellers, and to libraries.

transpose: switch around. Letters, words, parts of sentences, or larger sections of text can be transposed. There is a dedicated BSI mark for the purpose.

trim size: the size of a publication after it has been printed and cut to its intended dimensions.

turnover: in a list or table, any second or subsequent line.

typeface: the specific design of the set of characters used to create a text. Often referred to as a font, although that term is strictly a subdivision of a typeface, which can be thought of as a family of fonts. For instance, a document may use the typeface Arial, where the body text font is Arial Regular 11 points and headings are Arial Bold 14 points. Each typeface has a different design and takes up different amounts of space on the page.

typescript: a document produced by typing the text, either into a word-processing program or, in the past, on a typewriter.

typesetter: (also called a compositor) the person who puts the text into the typesetting program and lays it out in the design template. Historically, they ‘set’ the text in metal type by hand and made up the pages.

typeset/typesetting: at its most basic, to typeset means to set textual matter in type. Today it means taking a text produced in a word-processing program (eg Microsoft Word) and flowing it into a typesetting program such as Adobe InDesign or Quark Xpress (sometimes called file conversion) so that it follows the design template for the document.

typo (typographic error): historically, an error in setting metal type by hand, such as an upside-down character, but today it has come to mean any misprint.