InDesign Glossary

dingbat

1. A font character that displays a picture instead of a letter, number, or punctuation mark. There are entire font families of pictographic dingbats. 2. A printer's typographical ornament.

column

1. A vertical area for type, used to constrain line length to enhance design and readability. 2. A series of cells arranged vertically.

copy

1. Written matter intended to be reproduced in printed form. 2. The text of a news story, advertisement, television commercial, etc., as distinguished from related visual material.

BMP

A Windows bitmap image format that features low-quality and large file sizes.

dictionary

A collection of words used to determine appropriate spelling and hyphenation.

border

A continual line that extends around an element.

em dash

A dash (—) that indicates the separation of elements of a sentence or clause.

callout

A descriptive label referenced to a visual element, such as several words connected to the element by an arrow.

double-page spread

A design that spans the two pages visible to the reader at any open spot in a magazine, periodical, or book.

embedded font

A font that is made part of a document.

baseline shift

A formatting option that moves selected characters above or below the baseline of normal text.

color picker

A function within a graphics application that assists in selecting or setting a color.

anti-aliasing

A graphics software feature that eliminates or softens the jaggedness of low-resolution curved edges.

boldface

A heavier, blacker version of a typeface.

discretionary hyphen

A hyphen coded for display and printing only when formatting of the text puts the hyphenated word at the end of a line. Also called a "soft hyphen."

bullet

A marker preceding text, usually a solid dot, used to add emphasis; generally indicates the text is part of a list.

contextual menu

A menu containing options that are only relative to the object for which the menu is activated.

backslant

A name for characters that slant the opposite direction from italic characters.

align panel

A panel that provides a number of options for aligning objects, relative to each other or to the document.

clipping path

A path that determines which parts of an image show on the page. Anything inside the path shows and prints; anything outside the path won't. The clipping path essentially knocks out the unwanted part of the image.

color chart

A printed chart of various combinations of CMYK colors used as an aid for the selection of colors during the design phase of a project.

color proof

A printed or simulated printed image of the color separations intended to produce a close representation of the final reproduction for approval and as a guide to the press operator.

em

A printers measurement; the height, in points, of the font size.

Acrobat

A program developed by Adobe Systems, Inc. that allows the conversion of any document from any Macintosh or Windows application to PDF format. It is widely used for distributing documents online.

drop-down menu

A selection list.

dash

A short horizontal rule of varying lengths used to indicate a pause or clause in a sentence. See en dash, em dash.

by-line

A short phrase or paragraph that names and gives credit to the author of a piece.

cursor

A small symbol that can be moved around a video screen. Used to indicate the position where data will be entered or an action taken.

em space

A space that is of equal width in points to the point size. An em space in 10 point type is 10 points wide.

DICColor

A special-color library commonly used in Japan.

default

A specification for a mode of computer operation that occurs if no other is selected. The default font size might be 12 point, or a default color for an object might be white with a black border.

Acrobat Reader

A stand-alone program or Web browser plug-in from Adobe that allows you to view a PDF file. Acrobat Reader is free and can be downloaded from the Adobe Web site.

calibration bars

A strip of color blocks or tonal values on film, proofs, and press sheets, used to check the accuracy of color registration, quality, density, and ink coverage during a print run.

caps and small caps

A style of typesetting in which capital letters are used in the normal way, while the type that would normally be in lowercase is changed to capital letters of a smaller point size. A true small-caps typeface does not contain any lowercase letters.

character style sheet

A style sheet that defines only character formatting attributes, including font, type size, text color, and type style.

auxiliary dictionary

A supplementary file that is used to store unusual, technical, or other words that do not appear in the built-in dictionary.

color mode

A system for describing color, such as RGB, HLS, CIELAB, or CMYK.

automatic text box

A text box that appears on the default master page; it snaps to the defined margin guides.

editable text

A text element that the user can modify by entering or deleting keystrokes.

color space

A three-dimensional coordinate system in which any color can be represented as a point.

composite proof

A version of an illustration or page in which the process colors appear together to represent full color. When produced on a monochrome output device, colors are represented as shades of gray.

banding

A visible stair-stepping of shades in a gradient.

caps

Abbreviation for capital letters.

ATM

Adobe Type Manager. A utility that causes fonts to appear smooth on screen at any point size. It's also used to manage font libraries.

ASCII

American Standard Code for Information Interchange. Worldwide, standard ASCII text does not include formatting, and therefore can be exchanged and read by most computer systems.

bounding box

An area that defines the outer border of an object.

bleed size

An element of page geometry; the trim size plus the bleed allowance.

bitmap image

An image constructed from individual dots or pixels set to a gridlike mosaic. The file must contain information about the color and position of each pixel, so the disk space needed for bitmap images can be very large.

color key

An overlay color proof of acetate sheets, one for each of the four primary printing inks. The method was developed by 3M Corporation and remains a copyrighted term.

A/As

Author's Alterations. Changes made to the copy by the author after typesetting, and thus chargeable to the author.

clip art

Collections of predrawn and digitized graphics.

comp

Comprehensive artwork used to present the general color and layout of a page.

CMYK

Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black. The subtractive primaries, or process colors, used in four-color printing.

decorative font

Display type that is typically an artistic representation of some theme, which is commonly indicated in the font name (e.g., Eyechart or Papyrus).

bitmapped

Forming an image with a grid of pixels whose curved edges have discrete steps because of the approximation of the curve due to a finite number pixels.

display performance

In InDesign, this option allows you to choose Optimized Display, Typical Display, or High-Quality Display. Optimized Display grays out images, so the pages repaint faster; High-Quality Display enhances the display quality of images, and the page repaints slower.

dateline

In a news release, the identification of the city where the company issuing the release is located, as well as the date on which the release was written.

binding

In general, the various methods used to secure signatures or leaves in a book. Examples include saddle-stitching (the use of staples in a folded spine), and perfect-bound (multiple sets of folded pages sewn or glued into a flat spine).

attribute

Information included in the start tag of an element.

duplicate

Make a copy.

copyfitting

Making sure you don't write more text than you have room to accommodate.

control handle

Nonprinting lines that define the shape or segments that connect two anchor points.

coordinates

Numbers signifying a place in a Cartesian plane, represented by (x,y).

copyright

Ownership of a work. Permits the owner of material to prevent its use without express permission or acknowledgement of the originator. Copyright may be sold, transferred, or given up contractually.

bleed

Page data that extends beyond the trim marks on a page.

ascender

Part of a lowercase letter that exceeds the height of the letter "x". The letters b, d, f, h, k, l, and t have ascenders.

draw-type pictures

Pictures created from a series of instructions that tell the computer to draw lines, curves, rectangles, and other objects. Also called "objectoriented images" or "vector graphics." See bitmap image.

alignment

Positioning content to the left, right, center, top, or bottom.

center marks

Press marks that appear on the center of all sides of a press sheet to aid in positioning the print area on the paper.

crop marks

Printed lines used as guides for final trimming of the pages within a press sheet. Also called "trim marks."

coated

Printing papers that have a surface coating (of clay or other material) to provide a smoother, more even finish with greater opacity.

device-independent color

Reproduction in which the output color is absolute, and is not determined by the output device characteristics.

curly quotes

See smart quotes.

drop cap

Text formatting in which the first one or more characters in a paragraph is enlarged to occupy more than one line in the paragraph.

black

The absence of color. An ink that absorbs all wavelengths of light.

corner radius

The distance between the anchor points that define the corners of beveled-, rounded-, or concave-corner boxes.

binding edge

The edge of a page that is inserted into the publication's binding.

cropping

The elimination of parts of a photograph or other original that are not required to be printed.

bleed allowance

The extra portion of an element that extends beyond the page trim edge.

effective resolution

The final resolution of an image, calculated by dividing the image resolution (pixels per inch) by the magnification percentage.

document

The general term for a computer file containing text and/or graphics.

column guides

The guides that denote the location of gutters between columns.

baseline

The implied reference line on which the bases of capital letters sit.

anchor points

The individual points that define the shape of a vector-based graphic element. Anchor points are connected by line segments.

color composition

The ink components that are combined to make up a specific color.

caption

The lines of text that identify a picture or illustration, usually placed beneath it or otherwise in close proximity.

character count

The number of characters (letters, figures, signs, or spaces) in a selected block of copy.

editorial priority

The order of importance for text in a document.

clipboard

The portion of computer memory that holds data that has been cut or copied. The next item cut or copied replaces the data already in the clipboard.

additive color

The process of mixing red, green, and blue light to achieve a wide range of colors, as on a color television screen.

color separation

The process of transforming color artwork into components corresponding to the colors of ink being used, whether process or spot, or a combination of the two.

element

The smallest unit of a graphic, or a component of a page layout or design. Any object, text block, or graphic might be referred to as a design element.

bitmapping

The stairstepped appearance of graphics, caused by enlarging raster images.

Adobe Paragraph Composer

The text composition engine present in Adobe InDesign. Loosely based on Donald Knuth's TeX composition algorithms, this is the only desktop product that can perform text composition on multiple lines of text at one time.

body copy

The text portion of the copy on a page, as distinguished from headlines.

cap line

The theoretical line to which the tops of capital letters are aligned.

aspect ratio

The width-to-height proportions of an image.

collate

To gather together separate sections or leaves of a publication in the correct order for binding.

commercial printing

Typically, printing on high-capacity, high-resolution presses; processes include offset lithography, flexography, gravure, and screen printing. Offset printing is the most widely used commercial printing process.

Bézier curves

Vector curves that are defined mathematically. These curves can be scaled without the "jaggies" inherent in enlarging bitmapped fonts or graphics.