DTP Principles: Better Documents By Design

DTP Principles is an introductory guide to desktop publishing and typography which I produced in 2003, based on a series of articles I had written for RISC User magazine in 1999. From the back cover:

DTP Principles is a platform- and software-independent guide to understanding some of the most important fundamentals of word processing and desktop publishing. By concentrating on the universal principles of good document design, this guide provides valuable information for all users of DTP and word processing software, regardless of their choice of software and computer system. DTP Principles covers such important topics as:
• Planning a document's structure, from page design to text layout and attributes
• Understanding font styles, and how to choose the right font for your document
• How to present text well, by punctuating correctly and adding embellishments
• The Golden Ratio, and how to use it to give your documents excellent design balance

The publisher, Alligata Media, has decided to allow the booklet to be released as a free download in PDF format, and so I am hosting a copy on this site. However, please note that excellent quality printed copies are still available for purchase very inexpensively by anyone who wishes to buy the physical version. Details of how to obtain the printed booklet are supplied below.

Please note that this booklet is still copyright material, and appears here by courtesy of Alligata Media. DTP Principles may not be reproduced elsewhere in any form without the agreement of the publisher. Anyone wishing to republish part or all of this material should contact me in the first instance.

Download DTP Principles in Adobe Acrobat (PDF) format (2.8Mb)   (High-quality version for use in Adobe Reader, Adobe Acrobat, RiScript 5, Apple Preview and similar; see below if you have problems with this version)

Using the PDF

The PDF can be downloaded to your computer and saved to disk for viewing at your leisure in your choice of software (be it Adobe Reader or some other viewer application). You may need to do something special to bring up a 'download to disk' option in your Web browser, depending on your choice of browser and computer system. If clicking on the PDF link above causes the PDF to open within your browser's window, you should be able to find some means of saving a copy to disk so that you don't lose it when you close the window. Determining exactly how to do this is up to you!

The high-quality PDF file linked above is the version that most people should use. However, certain PDF-viewing applications exist (notably RiScript 4 and PDF for RISC OS, and presumably other conversions of the Unix xpdf software) which are incapable of displaying PostScript Type 1 fonts embedded within a document. The likely result of trying to view DTP Principles with such software will be pages with lots of blank areas where pieces of text should be, and/or unpleasantly stretched pieces of text that clearly look wrong. If you suffer from this problem, then you should instead download an alternative low-quality version of DTP Principles:

Download alternative DTP Principles PDF (degraded quality version with Type 3 fonts, 1.4Mb)

This alternative version has been produced in a different way, and works acceptably well with such software. It may look a lot less nice than the standard version (depending on your software), and it substitutes alternative fonts for the body text and various examples, but it is at least usable.

I'd like to express my thanks to Mrs Tonnie Demarteau for her assistance in the creation of this alternative version.

Obtaining the printed booklet

The booklet may also be bought in conjunction with an accompanying CD-ROM, with a choice between Ovation 1 (now Iyonix compatible), 75,000 items of clip-art or 5000 photos on the CD. For full details of availability and pricing please contact APDL.

Note: the PDF version available here is a slightly revised edition which contains a handful of minor corrections over the printed edition. However, the only significant differences between the two versions are as follows:

1. The figure 2 illustration on page 9 appears as intended in the PDF version; this fell foul of a printing error in the original booklet, and the most important part of its contents vanished!
2. In the PDF edition, an extra information box appears on page 17, concerning the fonts used in DTP Principles.