leading ... three fonts and nested styles 1

[onionpeeler]

Hi to all
this is a question about the formatting of a nested style, its got me stumped!

I have a triple list separated by tabs with leading between each entry eg:

(1 gillsansBOLD) ... (2 Arialnormal) ... (3 gillsans normal)

(1 gillsansBOLD) ... (2 Arialnormal) ... (3 gillsans normal)

(1 gillsansBOLD) ... (2 Arialnormal) ... (3 gillsans normal)


now the leading between 1 and 2 comes out bold because text 1 is bold... I need the leading there to be arial normal same as between 2 and 3.
Can anyone give me a clue on how to configure the nested style commands so this occurs? I've been trying for hours now and got nowhere.

best regards
Dave

 

[jmgalvin]

Instead of using the "normal" try using points for the leading. For 12pt Arial, the "normal" or auto leading is 14.4 pts. If that's reduced the test should jump up.

Using OSX 10.3.9 on a G4

 

[Ekwoman]

Do you mean "leader dots" instead of "leading?" Leading is the space between lines, but it sounds from your example that your leader dots are coming out bold and you want them to be normal.

In your example, is the first bit of text actually in parenthesis? So: (list item 1)...(list item 2)...(list item 3)? If so, your first nested style is gillsans BOLD up through the first ); next style is arial normal up TO the 2nd (; final style is gillsans normal through end nested style.

I have a screenshot of the style if you need it...hope I understood that correctly...

 

[onionpeeler]

thanks for your response! I get the feeling we are close here ....Yes I mean leader dots not leading ...my mistake there.

the first bit of text is a word in English in bold, (not in parenthesis)

then a space

then the leader dots which also come out in gillsans bold but need to be arial normal leader dots

another space

the second list entry is a phonetic description of the english word...(with forward slash before and after) and is in arial as it is about the only font that supports all the wacky letters used in the phonetic descriptions.

another space

then the arial leader dots

another space

then the word translated into Spanish in gillsans normal

e.g.

write ..... /ráait/ ..... escribir
geography ..... /yógrufi/ ..... geografía

 

[Ekwoman]

The key to getting nested styles to know when to change to the next style is having a constant, repeating element. How are you generating the leader dots? Are you manually entering them or are they part of a tab? Also, are they just the three dots (ellipsis)? If the amount of dots is different each time, you won't be able to use the dots as the "change to next style" indicator. However, you mention that you have a space before the dots. If you use a particular space (em space, en space, thin space, etc.) then you can choose that character from the pull down menu as the style change marker.

So, use the first font up through the first em space (for example), then switches to the font you need for the leader dots and that style is in effect up TO the next em space where it switches to the last font. Does that make sense?

 

[onionpeeler]

yeah, that makes very good sense!

I'm using left aligned tabs to generate the leader dots I enter just one . in the leader box for each tab.
I use the spacebar to generate the space so I'm not sure if that makes it em, en, or thin! using the space as a marker would be a help, but can be messed up if one entry has two words. I've had some marked success after messing about with the nested style commands ... your last post helped a lot!
Thanks for all your help!
Dave

 

[Ekwoman]

Glad I could help. If I know I'm going to be doing nested styles, I'll use one of the "set" spaces (em, en, thin) so that I don't create any confusion with the nested styles. I might even use two thin spaces where I might normally use a space because I'm certain I wouldn't use two thin spaces anywhere else. Remember, the change style marker can be two of something instead of one. You might also try having the style change on the tab if it doesn't interfere with anything else. Good luck! Nested styles are great once you get the hang of them.