Ink Paper Words' Profile

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Pacific Northwest, United States
In elementary school, I desperately wanted my mother to order books for me from those flyers Scholastic hands out to kids. She refused, citing the "perfectly good library down the street." I exacted revenge by becoming a card-carrying ALA accredited reference librarian. Ha! Take that!

Monday, July 29, 2013

Pagination Playhouse

My husband Daniele, despite all his inherent wonderfulosity, is, frankly, a terrible teacher. (Or, in current Eduspeak, my learning style and his teaching style conflict). Some time back, he demo'd Scribus, an open source equavalent to Adobe InDesign pagination software. Daniele's method of instructions is essentially "Here! Watch me do something fabulous!" I was always impressed but when left to my own devices, at a loss to know what to do with a blank screen and blinking cursor.

I sought out and worked through a few tutorials on the web, but it wasn't enough and the info wasn't sticking in my head. Then last week, it occurred to me to copy the front page of my local paper, or at least use it as a template and take off with my own pseudo-publication.

This method turns out to be the perfect learning method for me. I  seek how to do perform a task as I need
it. Things go wrong and I have to do it over and over until it's right. Yes, I know I'm rather OCD in this regard. It's what makes me one bitchin' editor. At any rate, my sample project is completed and the sense of revelation I have is no less than when AOL Help Desk supervisor Sean Astin showed me in 1997 that I could right-click on any web page to steal ...er, view code.


Volume 1, Number 1 of The Daily Dribbler. Bon Appetit!







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