Indexes: Part 7 — Lessons Learned in Using DEXembed for the First Time

Editor’s note: This version of the post incorporates corrections made by the author to the Options and Advice sections.

Ælfwine Mischler

I recently created an embedded index in Word for a book that will be published as an ebook and in print. I chose to use DEXembed because colleagues advised that its syntax — a space between the curly brackets and the enclosed text — will work better when the text is converted to an ebook.

A quick explanation of an embedded index: For a print book, the index is written after the book has been designed, using a PDF file of the final pages and page numbers as locators. This is changing, and many publishers are now asking for embedded indexes. For an embedded index, the indexer uses something else as locators. Depending on the program used, this could be paragraph numbers, word numbers, or temporary bookmarks. After indexing, the program embeds the entries by inserting field codes that look like this: { XE “main entry:subentry” }. The index is then generated from the field codes so the pages numbers are displayed. In an ebook, they may also be linked to the location in the text. If the book is designed as hardcover and paperback with different pagination, the embedded index entries will give the correct page numbers for each edition.

Embedded indexes are more work for the indexers, so most of us will charge more for an embedded index.

Options in DEXembed

DEXembed (available from the Editorium) is a Word add-on that allows the indexer to use dedicated indexing software rather than Word’s clunky built-in indexing function. DEXembed can use paragraphs, words, or numbers as locators — but only one type in a given document. Paragraph number was the best choice for this project, but the author had sometimes used auto-spacing and other times had used Enter twice between paragraphs. I told him repeatedly that he had to remove the extra Enters and make the spacing between paragraphs consistent (which he did) and that he could not change the paragraphing after I had started indexing. (More on that in the second part of this article in February 2019.)

Experienced colleagues in the Digital Publications Indexing Special Interest Group (DPI SIG) say that Word does not handle ranges of locators well. It is therefore better to mark only the beginnings of entries that are less than two pages long. DEXembed offers three options for ranges: Mark them with bookmarks, mark them with beginning and end codes, or do not mark them. The documentation for DEXembed says that publishers usually prefer begin and end codes.

Before starting my index, I sent two small sample indexes to my author’s publisher — one using bookmarks and one using begin and end codes — and asked which worked better for them. They got better results with the bookmarks, which also meant one less step for me in the end. Hurray!

I Won’t Talk to You

DPI SIG members also advised me that Word and InDesign use different syntax for some things, and I had to take this into consideration while indexing. I also found that my Sky indexing software and Word do not always communicate well.

This index required a separate scripture index of Qur’an verses. In Word, you can use an f-switch that is coded with \f followed by a name to make two indexes at once { “heading1” \f “subject” } and { “heading1” \f “quran” } (See Seth A. Maislin’s blog for more.) However, my colleagues advised that InDesign will reject XE fields with a backslash.

A suggested solution that I followed was to use two levels of subentries, with the main entries for the two indexes. That is, I had only two main entries, for which I used bold text, and my first level of subentry was the real main entry I wanted. The sub-subentry was the real subentry I wanted. The designers can adjust the indentation and spacing to make these appear as two separate indexes:

The chapter and verse numbers presented two other problems of their own. How to write something like 2:10? First, Word signals heading levels with a colon, so I had to use a backslash before the colon to tell Word that this was a literal colon, not a subheading signal. I admit that at that point, I had forgotten the warnings of my colleagues that InDesign would reject these entries.

As of this writing, I am waiting for the author’s comments and corrections, and the results of a small test index for the publisher: three entries using a backslash and colon, and three using a plus sign to be replaced by a colon in the generated index. If I do indeed have to remove \: from the index, I want to be sure that + is not a signal for something else in InDesign.

A second problem in writing chapter and verse numbers was the sorting. I knew that in Sky, I had to enter one- and two-digit chapter numbers with preceding zeros so they would sort properly. Thus, Chapter 2 was entered as 002 and Chapter 16 as 016. The verse numbers following the colons, however, sorted properly in Sky without additional zeros.

Word was not happy with that, but I could only learn that at the end. I finished my index, embedded the entries, generated the index, and then found that Word had mis-sorted the verses so that, for example, 18:70 came before 18:7. I had to open Sky, add the zeros to the verses, re-embed the entries, generate the new index, and remove the extra zeros from the generated index.

Maybe I’ll Talk a Little Bit

Another difference between Sky and Word is how they handle text to be ignored in sorting. Sky’s sorting automatically ignores prepositions at the beginning of subentries, but  Word’s does not. Sky also allows the indexer to code other things to be ignored in sorting. I commonly do this with the al- that begins many Arabic names.

For the embedded index, I had to enclose items to be ignored in angle brackets, but then in Sky, they all sorted to the top because they started with symbols. I was not sure that Word would put <al->Bukhari, <al->Ghazali, <al->Tabari, etc., in the proper places in the generated index. On this, I did have success, but I had to go back to the few subentries that begin with prepositions and enclose the prepositions in angle brackets.

DEXembed uses a text file to embed the entries, and all the bold and italics are lost in the process, although their coding remains. Once the entries were embedded, I had to edit the XE fields to get the bold and italic formatting back. (See Sue Klefstad’s blog post for details.) This was not difficult with a Find and Replace using wildcards (but be sure to turn off Tracked Changes!), but it was an extra step to perform.

Advice for Embedded Indexing

It is important to communicate with the author and publisher before beginning an embedded index. Learn how the Word manuscript will be handled after indexing and how it will be published. (There is more information on the resources page of the DPI SIG website.)

Once you have written your index in your dedicated indexing software, always embed in a copy of the document. Always keep the original “clean” and do not embed in it. Sometimes Word does not embed the entries properly and you might have to try again. DEXembed does have a function to remove embedded entries, but if Word gives you run-time errors as it did to me (see the second part of my February 2019 column), you will want to try again in a clean copy so there is no chance of stray coding in the file.

My thanks to colleagues Sue Klefstad and Seth A. Maislin for their invaluable blog posts, and to other colleagues in the DPI SIG for their advice in e-mail messages.

Ælfwine Mischler is an American copyeditor and indexer in Cairo, Egypt, who has been the head copyeditor at a large Islamic website and a senior editor for an EFL textbook publisher. She often edits and indexes books on Islamic studies, Middle East studies, and Egyptology.

The Business of Editing: The AAE Copyediting Roadmap VIII

Although it seems from the volume of the posts (this being the eighth in the series) that I have spent a lot of time on the manuscript but not gotten very far along the road, the opposite is truer: All that has gone before, with the exception of editing the reference list, took very little time. It takes longer to describe my steps than to perform them.

Each of the previous steps were necessary in my methodology as preludes to getting me to the point where I actually edit the manuscript. Now it is time to discuss some of the things done while actually editing the manuscript. I begin with reference renumbering.

Reference Renumbering

Not all manuscripts require reference renumbering, but a significant number do. The last major project I completed had 82 chapters made up of 10,000 manuscript pages and thousands of references (several chapters had more than 1000 references and many had between 500 and 900 references; the entire project had more than 21,000 references). Of those 82 chapters, 76 required reference renumbering; quite a few required renumbering beginning within the first 10 references (and one chapter had a half-dozen references that had to be inserted before reference 1).

Even if it turns out that a chapter’s references do not require renumbering, I need some way to make sure that references are called out in order; it is not unusual to have earlier references recalled out so that there is a sequence like this: 21, 22–24, 25, 26, 23, 27. I used to try to track the reference numbering and renumbering using pencil and paper; then I graduated to using an Excel spreadsheet. Both methods worked but they were cumbersome and time consuming. In addition, there wasn’t an easy way, in a chapter that required extensive renumbering, to quickly and easily track the renumbering.

Below is a sample page from a report generated by the References # Order Check macro (you can make the image, as well as other images in this essay, larger by clicking on the image). The format of the report is as follows: In the first shown entry (53,60), 53 is the original reference number as assigned by the author and found in the original reference list; 60 is the renumber value, that is, what was once numbered 53 is now renumbered as 60. As you look at the sample, you will see some numbers are followed by explanatory comments. If you would like to see the complete report, it is available for download from wordsnSync. The file is a PDF named Sample Reference Renumbering.

Reference Renumber Report

Reference # Order Check

The way I track references now is with EditTools’ Reference # Order Check macro, shown here:

The Renumbering Macro Dialog

For details on how this to use this macro, see Reference # Order Check. For purposes of this essay, there are only a couple of things to note. First, when I come to a reference callout in the text, assuming it does not need renumbering or a comment, I click on the corresponding number in the left numbering field (#A in image above). Doing so let’s me track what the next callout number should be. For example, if I have clicked on 1 to 7, I know the next numbered callout should be 8. If it is, I click 8; if instead it is 10, then I know I need to renumber. Renumbering is done by clicking in the blank field next to the number 10 in the main Renumber: field (#B in image). That will put the 10 in the Original: field (#C in image) and I enter its new number — 8 — or a comment or both in the Renumber: field (also at #C) and click Modify. The new number or the comment or both will appear in the main field (#B) opposite 10, and 8 will be removed from the left numbering field (#A). If the next callout is number 8, I repeat the renumbering process and renumber 8 as 9. And so it goes.

The Reference # Order Check macro does much more to help with numbering/renumbering, but a discussion of what else it does isn’t needed here. Take a look at the report the macro generates (see the complete Sample Reference Renumbering); I send a report to the client with every chapter/manuscript that requires reference list renumbering.

Managers on the Desktop

I do one more task before beginning actual editing: I open Bookmarks and the Managers for Toggle Word and Toggle Word Specialty. I also open Click List. I keep these open on one of my monitors (I use a three-monitor setup) because these are things I access frequently. With some projects, I also keep open the Never Spell Word Manager. In a large project, I will keep the NSW Manager open as I edit the early chapters, but with later chapters, I only open it when needed.

Bookmarks have already been discussed (see The Business of Editing: The AAE Copyediting Roadmap IV). Click List lets me insert items with a single click. Take a look at the Click List image below. In the image, the Symbols tab is showing. Before Click List, if I needed to insert a division sign (÷), I had to open Word’s Symbol dialog, search for the symbol, and double-click it to insert it into the document. It took time — sometimes a lot of time, sometimes only a little time — to find the symbol I needed. With Click List, I do that search once, add the symbol and my own name for it using the Click List Manager, and thereafter I insert it with a single mouse click from Click List. The Click List can be used for just about anything, from a symbol (e.g., ä or ≈ or Ǻ) to a lengthy phrase (e.g., including the opening space, “ of total antigen per dose” or “References for this chapter are available at Xxxxx.com.”). Click List is an excellent example of creating the wheel once and reusing it.

Symbols Tab in Click List

Toggle Word

Of all the macros I use during editing, none is more valuable than the Toggle Word macro. The Managers for Toggle Specialty and Toggle Word are shown here:

Toggle Word and Toggle Word Specialty Managers

The Toggle macro lets me select a word or phrase or acronym/initialism and change it quickly, easily, and, most importantly, accurately. Although I can type, I still make lots of typing errors. For example, it isn’t uncommon for me to type chatper instead of chapter. In that case, autocorrect takes care of the error, but things get dicier when I need to type N,N-diethyl-3-methylbenzamide. I may not notice a mistyping, which would be a tragedy, but even more tragic — for me — is the time I need to spend to type it, check it to make sure it is correct, and correct it if wrong. A couple of clicks is much better — quicker, easier, more accurate, and profit-enhancing.

Toggle works with tracking on, so I can undo at any time. Toggle also can give me options. For example, N,N-diethyl-3-methylbenzamide is the chemical name for DEET. When I am editing a manuscript, my clients want acronyms and initialisms spelled out at first mention (unless the style dictates that a particular acronym/initialism does not have to be spelled out, which is usually the case with, e.g., HIV/AIDS). So, when I come across the first instance of DEET in the manuscript, I place my cursor in or I select DEET and press my shortcut key for Toggle. The following dialog then appears:

Toggle Can Offer Options

Toggle displays my options based on what I have entered in the dataset. (If there are no options, it just makes the change that is in the dataset.) It is important to note that Toggle checks all of the datasets that appear in the Toggle Manager as well as the designated Toggle Specialty dataset, not just the dataset for the topmost tab. The image of the Toggle and Toggle Specialty Managers above shows 11 datasets — one for each tab plus the specialty — and when I run Toggle, it checks all of them for the selected word and displays all of the options. I choose the option I want and click OK. The word or phrase is replaced, no typing involved.

I keep the Toggle and Toggle Specialty Managers open as I edit so I can add new words to the datasets. The idea is to create the wheel once and reuse it; Toggle is a macro that lets me do that during editing.

Hotkeys: Worth Noting & Doing

EditTools macros are intended to make editing quicker, easier, more accurate, and more profitable. Consequently, easy access to regularly used macros is important. Most of the macros in EditTools can be assigned to keyboard shortcuts or Hotkeys. This is easily done by either clicking on the Setup Hotkey button, which is generally found at the bottom of a macro’s Manager, or by clicking the Hotkeys menu in the Preferences section of the EditTools toolbar.

I have assigned Hotkeys to those macros and managers that I use frequently. Because I keep the Toggle Word Manager open as I edit, it does not have an assigned hotkey — it is opened once and left open; in contrast, the Toggle macro is assigned a hotkey because it is not a macro that is (or can be) kept open but it is accessed frequently. Examples of other macros I have assigned to hotkeys are Enhanced Search, Count, & Replace; Smart Highlighter; and Insert Query. You can (and should) customize Hotkeys to fit your needs.

Moving On

Another macro I use often during editing is Enhanced Search, Count, and Replace, which is the subject of The Business of Editing: The AAE Copyediting Roadmap IX.

Richard Adin, An American Editor

The Business of Editing: The AAE Copyediting Roadmap III

A manuscript is generally “tagged” in one of two ways: by applying typecodes (e.g., <h1>, <txt>, <out1>) or by applying styles (e.g., Word’s built-in styles Heading 1 and Normal). My clients supply a list of the typecodes they want used or, if they want styles applied, a template with the styles built into the template. Occasionally clients have sent just a list of style names to use and tell me that, for example, Heading 1 should be bold and all capitals, leaving it to me to create the template. The big “issue” with typecoding is whether the client wants both beginning and ending codes or just beginning codes; with EditTools either is easy. Some clients want a manuscript typecoded, but most clients want it styled.

Typecoding

If the client wants typecoding, I use EditTools’ Code Inserter Manager (shown below) to create the codes to be applied. Detailed information on Code Inserter and its Manager is found at wordsnSync. I will focus on EditTools’ Style Inserter and its Manager here because that is what I use most often. Code Inserter and Style Inserter and their Managers work very similarly. Describing one is nearly a perfect description of the other. (You can make an image in this essay larger by clicking on the image.)

Code Inserter Manager

Style Inserter

Style Inserter relies on a template. Usually the client provides a template, but if not, the client at least provides the names of the styles it wants used and a description of the style (e.g., Heading 1, All Caps, bold; Heading 2, title case, bold; etc.) and I create a template for the client. Occasionally the client uses Word’s default styles. Once there is a template, I open Style Inserter Manager, shown below, and create styles that the Style Inserter macro will apply.

Style Inserter Manager

As you can see, Style Inserter Manager gives me a great deal of control over the style and what it will look like. When styles are applied in Word, one has to go through several steps to apply it. Style Inserter is a one-click solution. The information I entered into the Manager is translated into the Style Inserter macro (shown below). I organize the dialog how it works best for me and keep it open as I style the manuscript. A single click applies the style and can move me to the next paragraph that requires styling.

Style Inserter

(If you do typecoding, you can tell the Code Inserter Manager whether you need just beginning codes or both beginning and ending codes. Like Style Inserter, once you have set up the coding in the Manager, you only need a single click to enter a code. As shown below, the macro looks and acts the same as Style Inserter. You do need a second click to enter an ending code because it is not always possible to predetermine where that end code is to be placed.)

Code Inserter

Take a look at the Style Inserter Manager shown earlier. There are several formatting options available but there are two I want to especially note: Head Casing (#A in image) and Language (#B).

I am always instructed to apply the correct capitalization to a heading. It is not enough that the definition of the style applied to the head includes capitalization; the head has to have the correct style applied and the correct capitalization. If None is chosen, then however the head is capitalized in the manuscript is how it remains. If the head should be all capitals, then I would choose Upper from the drop down list (shown here):

Head Casing dropdown

Whatever capitalization style I select will be imposed on the head as part of applying the style. No extra steps are required once the capitalization requirements are made part of the style in the Manager. Title case capitalization is governed by the Heading Casing Manager, which is found in the Casing menu on the EditTools toolbar.

Head Casing

The Heading Case Manager (shown below) has two tabs: Head Casing and Words to Ignore. In the Head Casing tab you enter words or acronyms that are to always be all capitals or all lowercase. In addition, you indicate if that “always rule” is to be ignored. The Words to Ignore tab is where you list words that should be ignored when casing is applied, such as Roman numerals and symbols or acronyms like “miRNA”. Thus, for example, even though the instruction is that the head is to be all capitals, the “mi” in “miRNA” will remain lowercase. This works the same in the Code Inserter Manager.

Head Casing Manager

Setting the Language

The Language option (#B in the Style Inserter Manager image above) is also important. One of the frustrating things for me is when I am editing and I realize that the authors (or some gremlin) set the paragraph’s language as Farsi and when I correct a misspelling it still shows as a misspelling because I am using American English. The Language option lets me choose the language I want applied (see image below). Selecting the language from the dropdown (here “English U.S.”) and also checking the Language box, will incorporate into the style that will be applied by Style Inserter the instruction to set the language to what I have chosen — overriding the language attribute that is present in the manuscript.

Language Option in Style Manager

I make it a habit to incorporate the language instruction in every style. It saves me from wondering why the red squiggly line appears under a correctly spelled word, thereby removing an obstacle that slows editing (and lowers profitability). This works the same in the Code Inserter Manager.

Bookmarking While Styling

As I style the manuscript, I also insert bookmarks using EditTools’ Bookmarks. The bookmarks let me track elements of the manuscript. This is especially true because with EditTools’ Bookmarks I can create meaningful bookmarks, which is where we will start in The Business of Editing: The AAE Copyediting Roadmap IV.

Combo Click

But before we get to Bookmarks and the next essay, I want to mention another EditTools macro: Combo Click. I have found that when I do certain tasks I like to have certain macro managers open. Combo Click, shown below, lets me choose my combination of managers that I want open. Instead of having to click on each manager individually, I click on the combination in Combo Click and those managers open.

Combo Click

Creating the combinations is easy with the Combo Click Manager shown here:

Combo Click Manager

Reusing the Wheel

The idea is to do as much work as possible quickly and with a minimum of effort. When I first set up, for example, Style Inserter, it takes a few minutes that I would not have to spend if I simply used the standard Word method. So editing chapter 1 may take me a few minutes longer than if I weren’t creating the Style Inserter dataset, but all subsequent chapters will take me less time than without Style Inserter. My point is that the smart businessperson looks at the macro picture, not the micro picture. EditTools works using datasets that the editor creates. Those datasets are the wheels — you create them and reuse them.

The next project I do for the client means I can load a previously created Style Inserter dataset and I can add those styles that are not already included and delete those that are no longer needed — a faster method than starting from scratch — and then save the new dataset under a new name.

The Business of Editing: The AAE Copyediting Roadmap IV picks up with Bookmarks and how I use them to help me remember to perform certain tasks and to navigate the manuscript.

Richard Adin, An American Editor

EditTools: Duplicate References — A Preview

The current version of EditTools is nearly 1 year old. Over the past months, a lot of work has gone into improvements to existing functions and in creating new functions. Shortly, a new version of EditTools will be released (it will be a free upgrade for registered users).

New in the forthcoming version is the Find Duplicate References macro, which is listed as Duplicate Refs on the References menu as shown here:

Duplicate Refs on the References Menu

The preliminaries

The macro works with both unnumbered and numbered reference lists (works better when the numbers are not autonumbers, but it does work with autonumbered lists). It also works with the reference list left in the manuscript with the text paragraphs and when the reference list has been moved temporarily to its own file (it works, like other reference-specific macros in EditTools, better when the references are moved to a separate, references-only file).

Like all macros, the Find Duplicate References macro is “dumb”; that is, it only finds identical references. The following image shows references 19 and 78 as submitted for editing. (For all images in this essay: For a larger, more readable image, right-click on the image and click “Open link in new tab.” This will open a larger version of the image in a new tab that can be kept open as you read the description of the image.)

Original References

As the image shows, although references 19 and 78 are identical references and are likely to appear identical to an editor, they will not appear identical to the Find Duplicate References macro. Items 1 and 2 show a slight difference in the author name (19: “Infant”, 78: “Infantile”). The journal names are different in that in 19 the abbreviated name is used (#3) whereas in 78 the name is spelled out (#4). Finally, as #5 and #6 show, there are a couple of differences in the cite information, namely, the order, the use of a hyphen or en-dash to indicate range, and the final page number.

Because any one of these differences would prevent the macro from pairing these references and marking them as potentially identical, it is important that the references go through a round of editing first. After editing, which for EditTools users should also include running the Journals macro, the references are likely to look like this:

The References After Editing

If you compare the same items (1 and 2, 3 and 4, 5 and 6) in the above image, you will see that they now better match. (Ignore the inserted comments for now; they are discussed below.) One more step is required before the Find Duplicate References macro can be run — you need to accept all of the changes that were made. Remember that in Word, when changes are made with Tracking on, the material marked as deleted is not yet deleted; consequently, when the macro is run, the Tracked items will interfere (as will any comments, which also need to be deleted). The best method is to (1) save the tracked version, (2) accept all the changes, (3) use EditTools’ Comment Editor to delete any comments, and (4) save this clean version to run the Find Duplicate References macro.

After accepting all changes and deleting the comments, the entries for references 19 and 78 look like this:

The References After Changes Accepted

Running the macro

When the Find Duplicate References macro is run, the following message box appears.

Find Duplicate References Message Box

To run the macro, the macro has to be told where to begin and end its search. If the references are in a separate file from the rest of the manuscript, check the box indicating that the references are in a standalone document (#5) and click Run (#6). If the references are in a file with other material, use bookmarks to mark the beginning and ending of the list as instructed at the top of the message box (#1). To make it easier, the Bookmarks macro now has buttons to insert these bookmarks:

The dupBegin and dupEnd Bookmark Insert Buttons

The Find Duplicate References macro matches a set number of characters, including spaces. The default is 120 (#4) but you can change the number to 36, 48, 60, 72, 84, 96, or 108 using the dropdown arrow shown at #4 in the Find Duplicate References message box above.

The macro does a two-pass search, one from the beginning of the reference and another from the end of the reference, which is why a list of duplicates may have repetitions.

The results of the search appear like this:

List of Possible Duplicate References

(They appear as tracked changes only if the macro is run with Tracking on; if Tracking is off, the results appear as normal text.) Note the title of the duplicates is “Duplicate Entries (Nondefinitive).” The reason for “Nondefinitive” is to remind you that the macro is “dumb” and there is no guarantee that the list includes all duplicates or that all listed items are duplicated. Much of the macro’s accuracy depends on the consistency of editing, including formatting.

For the examples in this essay, the Find Duplicate References macro was run on a list of 735 references and the list of possibilities shown represents those likely duplicate references the macro found. Note that references 19 and 78 were found (#19 and #78 indicate the portions of those references found duplicated by each pass of the macro); however, if, for example, in editing the page range separator in #19 was left as an en-dash in reference 19 and in reference 78 as a hyphen, the macro would not have listed the material at #19 as there would not have been a match. Similarly, if the author name in reference 19 had been left as “Infant” and in reference 78 as “Infantile”, the macro would not have listed the material at #78 as there would not have been a match.

The next step is for the editor to determine which of the listed possibilities are duplicates. This is done using Word’s Find Navigation pane, as shown here:

Verifying Duplicate References

Copy part or all of what was found (#1) into the Find field (#2). Find will display the search results (“3 matches”) (#3); clicking the Browse button (the rightmost button at #3) lists the three matches found (#4 to #6). The first entry (#4) is always the text in the duplicates list (#1), which means that, in this example, the possible duplicates are #5 and #6. Clicking on the text marked #5 to see the complete text of that entry. Then compare that text to the text of the reference at #6. (It is possible for the macro to find more than two possible matches for the same text — and all, some, or none may be duplicates.)

Tip: Use comments to track duplicates

---

When I find a duplicate, I insert a prewritten, standardized comment (using EditTools’ Insert Query) to tell the client that references x and y are duplicates and that I am deleting one and renumbering it (see image below for a sample comment). I insert the comment at each of the duplicate references, although I slightly modify the comment so that it is appropriate for the reference to which it is being attached. The comment shown below is inserted at reference 78 and its language is appropriate for that reference. It tells the client that references 19 and 78 are identical and that reference 78 has been deleted and renumbered as 19. This type of comment is added to the version (e.g., the Track Changes version) of the reference list that will be given the client. The comment is added to the appropriate references as duplication is confirmed.

The Inserted Comment

The comment, in addition to serving as a message to the client, serves as a reminder message during editing of the manuscript. Duplicate references require renumbering so as to keep reference callouts in number order. For example, it may be that reference 78 is called out after the callout for reference 10 and before that for 19. In that case, reference 78 would be moved to position 11 in the list and renumbered as 11 and the comment would be modified (easy to do using EditTools’ Comment Editor). A prewritten note (another new EditTools feature) would be inserted at point 78 in EditTools’ Reference Number Order Check and reference 19 would be marked as deleted, the inserted comment (see above) would be modified, and a note would be added to Reference Number Order Check at point 19. (See the discussion below about the report.)

---

When editing of the manuscript is finished, have the Reference Number Order Check macro export a renumbering report to send with the edited file to the client. A partial sample report is shown here:

Sample Partial Renumbering Report

Every report bears the creator’s identification information (#1) and file title (#2). You set the creator information once and it remains the same for every report until you change it using a manager. The file title is set each time you create a report.

As the report shows, reference 78 was deleted and all callouts numbered 78 were renumbered as 19 (#3). The prewritten, standard message (a new feature) can be inserted with a mouse click; only the numbers need to be inserted or modified. The report shows that the renumbering stopped at callout 176 (#4) and started again at 197 (#5). Number 6 shows another deletion and renumbering.

Clients like these reports because it makes it easy for authors, proofreaders, and others involved in the production process to track what was done.

The Find Duplicate References macro is a handy addition to EditTools. While it is easy in very short reference lists to check for duplicate references, as the number of references grows, checking for duplicates becomes increasingly difficult and time-consuming. The Find Duplicate References macro saves a lot of time, thereby increasing an editor’s profits.

Richard Adin, An American Editor

EditTools & My Editing Process: Part III

Part I introduced the preediting steps (Steps 1 to 3). Part II discussed the remaining two preediting steps (Steps 4 and 5) and then discussed the first editing step (Step 6) in my editing process, which is editing the references. Part III finishes the editing process with Step 7, which focuses on editing the main text.

Step 7: Editing the Text

I use a three-monitor desktop system for editing. When I edit the text, I have the primary document open on the first monitor, the online stylesheet open on the middle monitor, and other needed documents, such as the references, open on the right-hand monitor. I also have open several of the EditTools tools I use while editing (see below for an example), such as Bookmarks, Click List, Reference # Order Check (if the references are numbered rather than name–date style), and Toggle Specialty Manager. Once I start adding author queries using the Insert Query macro, I may add Comment Editor to the open tools mix.

Sample of EditTools Macros

I keep these tools open on the desktop because I use them often. Bookmarks are both navigational aids and tracking aids. The Reference # Order Check provides a way to track reference callouts and renumbering them if renumbering is required. Click List provides a quick-and-easy method for inserting text or symbols. Toggle Specialty Manager lets me add to the active Toggle list new project-specific terms that I encounter while editing.

As I edit, I know that decisions will need to be made. For example, should I let an acronym stand or should I replace it with its spelled-out version? If the client has a rule governing usage, I need to be able to apply it. So, for example, when I come across travel risk management (TRM), I run the ESCR (Enhanced Search, Count, & Replace) macro, shown below, to determine how many times in the document the phrase travel risk management appears and how many times TRM appears.

ESCR looks for these variations (I can add additional ones)

ESCR macro

and provides this report

ESCR Report

Using the report screen, I can make changes to the text. For example, in the above report, travel risk management appears 10 additional times in the document. I can also see that the acronym TRM is often used. Consequently, for consistency, assuming that TRM is acceptable to the client, I need to change travel risk management to TRM. Thus I type TRM in fields #1 and #2 and I check the highlight box (#3) next to TRM. I also leave TRM3 as it is, because that is different from TRM and needs to be defined and searched for separately. Clicking OK then lets the macro change all 11 instances of travel risk management to TRM with tracking on. The macro also yellow highlights the 37 instances of TRM. As I edit the document now, when I see the yellow-highlighted TRM, I know that it has already been defined earlier in the chapter and that the decision was made to use the acronym rather than the phrase. Had the report come back saying there were only two instances of TRM, then the decision might have been to use the spelled-out version instead of the acronym.

If travel risk management (TRM) is not in my Word Specialty dataset, I add it (I also add it to the online stylesheet if it is not already there), using the Acronym/Phrase entry system (shown below).

Toggle Word Acronym/Phrase entry system

In the future, if I come across an instance of TRM that needs to be spelled out, I can click Toggle Word and choose from among several options, as shown here:

Toggle Word Choice Menu

If I need to query the author or make a comment to the compositor, I use Insert Query (see below). With Insert Query, I can call upon a previously written query that I have saved, or create a brand-new query, which I can save, or not, to the dataset for future reuse.

Insert Query

If I want to alter a query for any reason, or even if I want to delete a query — whether it is located 20 pages ago or where I currently am — I use Comment Editor, shown here:

Comment Editor

Comment Editor lists all of the queries I have inserted in the document (#1). There is no limit to the number of queries Comment Editor will list. One of the nice things about Comment Editor is that I do not need to go to the page where the query is located to edit it. I select the query that I want to edit and the complete text of the query appears in the Text box (#2), where I can edit or completely rewrite it. If I want to go to the query in the manuscript, I can click Go To Comment (#3). That will take me to the query’s location. To return to where I was in the document, I click Return to Before (the name is odd but it refers to the bookmark that was inserted). I can also delete a query by selecting it and clicking Delete (#4). With Comment Editor I do not need to spend time trying to locate the query I want to modify, going to it, and then returning to where I was in the document.

As I indicated earlier, I use the Bookmarks macro as a way to track figures, tables, and text boxes. I also use it to mark items I need to return to for some reason. Unlike Word’s Bookmark feature, EditTools’ Bookmarks lets you use descriptive language. That helps greatly when, for example, you want to bookmark a sentence to recheck. With EditTools’ Bookmarks you could insert “Recheck this sentence – has TRM been mentioned?”, as shown here:

Bookmarks

I use the Bookmarks renaming function for tracking. If Figure 1 has been called out in the text and I have edited the figure and its caption, I rename the bookmark. I select the bookmark and click Rename (#1), which brings up the renaming dialog shown here:

Bookmarks Renaming Dialog

The renaming dialog tells me which bookmark I am renaming (#1). Because I have selected certain items to be the defaults (#2 and #3), the new name automatically appears in the To field (#4). I could choose a different prefix or suffix, add new ones, change the defaults, and even choose None (meaning either no prefix or no suffix is to be used). If the default is what I want, I click OK and the change is made, as shown below, but the bookmark remains in the same location.

After Renaming

When I am done editing the document, I bring the reference file back into the main document using Word’s Insert File feature. I then run one last EditTools macro, Remove All Highlighting, which is found in the Other menu on the Highlight menu, as shown here:

Remove All Highlighting

Running that macro will remove all the highlighting I have added during editing. It has no effect on Track Changes, just on the highlighting. If I need to keep certain highlighting, I instead run the Choose Highlighting To Remove macro. When I run that macro, it searches through the document to determine what highlighting colors are used in the document and lists them, as shown here:

Choose Highlighting to Remove

I select the colors I want removed and click OK.

That’s pretty much the process I follow and the way I use many of the EditTools macros. I haven’t mentioned several macros, because they are not part of my usual editing process. I do use them, just not with the frequency of those described above. Under the right circumstances, these other EditTools macros can be very useful.

If you are a user of EditTools, share your experience with EditTools and tell us which macros you use and when you use them.

Richard Adin, An American Editor

_______________

Looking for a Deal?

You can buy EditTools in a package with PerfectIt and Editor’s Toolkit Plus 2014 at a special savings of $78 off the price if bought individually. To purchase the package at the special deal price, click Editor’s Toolkit Ultimate.

EditTools & My Editing Process: Part I

I have been asked to describe how EditTools fits in the editing process. I have avoided doing so because each editor works differently and the way I edit suits me but may not suit someone else. However, I have been asked that again as part of a question about EditTools, and I have decided that perhaps the time has come to explain how I use EditTools in my editing process.

Usually the manuscripts I edit — all nonfiction, with a majority being STEM (science, technology, engineering, and medicine) — come to me in groups of a few chapters. Occasionally I will receive the entire book, but even then it is usually divided into chapter files. When the book is given to me as a single file, I divide it into chapter files.

I know some editors prefer to work with a single file that represents the whole book. I do not, for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that the books I usually work on are much too long to effectively edit as a single file — sometimes a single chapter runs more than 400 manuscript pages. In addition, Word is not the most stable of programs, and the larger the file (and the more that goes on in the file), the more likely it is that Word will crash — and keep on crashing. More important, however, is that by working on chapter-size files, I can add to my EditTools datasets and have those additions applied in future chapters. Without reading every word, I cannot know in advance every decision that I need to make.

Before-Editing Steps

Step 1: Delete Unused Styles

I receive basically two types of files: ones that the authors designed and ones that the clients have manipulated before sending them to me (in my work, authors are not my clients). Sometimes I need to apply a template to the file. In the case of the author-designed file or a file to which I need to apply a template, the first thing I do is run the Delete Unused Styles macro (#1) shown here:

Delete Unused Styles

By running this macro, I eliminate many (not all) of the author-created styles that aren’t used in the document and narrow the number of styles that I need to deal with.

Step 2: Cleanup & Style Language

After that, I run the Cleanup macro (#2). The Cleanup macro has its own Manager (shown below), which lets me set what I want cleaned up (#3). It also lets me link to a Specialty file (#4) for additional cleanup that is specific to the project (or type of project) I am working on. The Manager lets me set the order of the cleanup by moving the items around, although I don’t bother — instead I run the macro twice. The main field shows me what will be done (#5). And, as is true of all EditTools datasets, I can save my cleanup profile (#6). What that means is that I can create custom cleanups based on client or type of project or any other criterion and recall them as needed.

Cleanup macro

As part of this step, I also run the Change Style Language macro, which is found under Other on the Other menu, as shown here.

Change Style Language

I run the macro to make sure that the language used is uniformly U.S. English and to make sure Spell Check is on. Authors tend to use multiple languages and sometimes turn off Spell Check. The macro gives me the option to choose any Word-supported language and to turn Spell Check on or off, as shown here:

Choosing the Spell Check Language

After I have made my choices, I click Update and the macro will update the document’s styles.

This is also the step where I run the Superscript Me macro, which is found on the References menu, as shown here:

Superscript Me

Superscript Me lets me change how reference numbers appear in the text. For example, if the author has the numbers in square brackets (e.g., [122]) when they should be superscript without the brackets, I can quickly make the change throughout the document by running this macro. The macro also lets me choose how the numbers are to appear in relation to punctuation; the choices are between the AMA and the Chicago options, as shown here:

Setting Superscript Me’s Options

(Tip: If the numbers are correctly superscripted but incorrectly placed in relation to punctuation, select None and the correct style type, then run the macro. The numbers will remain superscript, but the style will be corrected. This will also clear out any spaces in superscripted numbers following a comma [e.g., superscripted 132, 134 will become superscripted 132,134].)

Step 3A: Coding & Styling

After the Cleanup step, I code or style the document. In the “olden” days, I applied the codes or styles as I edited, but with EditTools, it is easier and quicker to apply them before editing begins. I may change some during editing (e.g., change a numbered list to a bulleted list), but nearly all remain as originally coded/styled.

Most of the projects I work on require me to either add coding or apply client template styles to the text. If it is codes, I use the Code Inserter Manager; if it is styles, I use the Style Inserter Manager. Consequently, creating the Inserter dataset for the project is next on my to-do list. Because clients tend to use the same styles and codes, I generally open an existing dataset and just make necessary changes, such as in the way a head is to appear (e.g., title case bold, all capitals, or sentence case italic). Here is a Code Inserter Manager dataset:

Code Inserter Manager dataset

Note that the sample is the 9th edition of a book (#7). I took the project-specific Code Inserter dataset for the 8th edition of this book and copied it for the 9th edition, and then made whatever changes were required, such as in head casing (#8) or options (#9) or code to be used (#10). Within a few minutes, I was set to begin coding.

The same is true with the Style Inserter, shown below. Often a client uses standard designs rather than creating a new design for each book. The client tells me the standard design to use for the project and I open the style dataset (#7) for that design. Again, I may need to make some adjustments (#8, #9, #10), but once I have created the basic dataset, I can reuse it repeatedly (#7). The Style Inserter Manager is very similar to the Code Inserter Manager.

Style Inserter Manager dataset

Step 3B: Bookmarks

At the same time that I open the Inserter (Step 3A), I open the Bookmarks macro, shown below. (In cases where I do not have to code/style, this is the only portion of Step 3 that I do.) I always add two bookmarks — refs, which is required by the NSW macro, and editing paused here, which is my generic bookmark for when I pause in editing for some reason (arrows & #11) — to every manuscript. In addition, as I code/style, I insert a bookmark at each table (e.g., Table 01, Table 02, etc.) and figure (e.g., Fig 01, Fig 02, etc.), and at any other item, such as boxed text, that I may need to find again. I use the bookmarks as a way to track what tables and figures have been called out in text and edited. They also provide an easy way to get from my current location to where the table or figure is located, and back again. After I edit a figure, for example, Fig 01, I change its bookmark name to x Fig 01 edited. The x causes the bookmark to move to the end of the list and edited tells me that it has been edited. This makes it easy to catch a missed text callout as well as to get to and from a figure, table, or other bookmarked text.

Bookmarks

Part II continues the preediting steps (Steps 4 and 5) and introduces the first editing step (Step 6), which is editing the references. Part III discusses the final step (Step 7), editing the text.

Richard Adin, An American Editor

_______________

Looking for a Deal?

You can buy EditTools in a package with PerfectIt and Editor’s Toolkit Plus 2014 at a special savings of $78 off the price if bought individually. To purchase the package at the special deal price, click Editor’s Toolkit Ultimate.

The Business of Editing: Using & Managing Bookmarks

When speaking about the editing process with colleagues, I am always amazed that they so rarely use one of the most valuable tools that Microsoft provides — bookmarks. It’s not that I don’t understand why, but rather that because the Microsoft way is so cumbersome, colleagues simply don’t make much use of bookmarks.

Bookmarking is, for me, a valuable way to navigate the long documents I edit. They enable me to pinpoint locations quickly. With EditTools’ new Bookmarks macro, which allows me to make use of easy-to-read and more logical navigation-oriented bookmarks, I make even greater use of bookmarks.

Bookmarks the Microsoft Way

Microsoft (using Word 2010 as the example) requires me to take these steps to use bookmarking:

1. Switch to the Insert ribbon.
2. Click Bookmark.
3. Type a name for the bookmark
4. Click Insert.

That doesn’t seems so bad unless you want to manage your bookmarks. The first problem is with the bookmark name. I like meaningful names, such as EMMA software 1st use. Try to use that in Word’s system; you can’t because it has spaces and mixes letters and numbers — both unacceptable to Word.

Try moving a bookmark from location A to location B using Word’s system. A bookmark I regularly use is editing stopped here to indicate where I am in a manuscript when I stop because I need to go to another section of the manuscript. I use it to tell me where I was and to give me a method for getting back to that place. In Word’s method, to move the bookmark, I need to delete the bookmark and reenter it.

The other thing I like to do is rename a bookmark. Renaming bookmarks lets me use bookmarks to track whether figures and tables are called out in order and whether I have edited a figure or table legend. In Word’s system, renaming can only be done by going to the location of the bookmark, deleting the existing bookmark, and adding a new-name bookmark in its place.

Another problem with Word’s system is that to resume editing of my document, the bookmark dialog has to be closed. To make any change to any bookmark — whether that means adding, deleting, renaming, or moving — I have to open and close the dialog. Not only does that take time, but it makes for poor management efficiency for someone who likes to use bookmarks.

Basically, Microsoft is costing me money because every second counts in editing for profit. EditTools’ new Bookmarks macro makes bookmarking much more efficient and less time-consuming, which means more profit.

EditTools’ Bookmarks

As I said, I make extensive use of bookmarks. I bookmark every figure and table, for example. Not the in-text callouts, but the located-at-the-end-of-the-document figure legends and tables that I need to edit. If a document has five figures, then I have five figure bookmarks: figure 1, figure 2, etc. Same with tables. And as I edit I add bookmarks to things I think I might need to return to from later in the chapter, such as a formula, an acronym, a particular “term of art,” or a name, whether of a person or a study. I sometimes have 50 or more bookmarks in a document — now that I have EditTools’ Bookmarks macro and can use easy-to-read-and-meaningful names.

The Bookmarks dialog looks like this (click on images to enlarge):

EditTools Bookmarks

The Bookmarks dialog shows a list of already inserted bookmarks in a document. When you open a document in Word and then open Bookmarks, Bookmarks will populate itself (#3) and list whatever bookmarks are already in the document. You can either keep them, delete specific ones, or click Delete All to delete bookmarks from the document — and it doesn’t matter whether it was you or someone else who originally inserted the bookmarks.

Inserting a bookmark

To insert a bookmark, enter its name in the Bookmark Name field (#1). As shown (#3), you can use spaces and mix letters and numbers; a name can be up to 30 characters long. After entering the name, click Add (#2) to add the bookmark to your document and to the list of bookmarks (#3).

Before editing, I go through a document and insert the “primary” bookmarks, that is, one for each figure and table legend, and one for where I want the “refs” bookmark used by Never Spell Word and other macros located. “Secondary” bookmarks are added as I edit. For example, if the author calls a software program EMMA, when I first come across it, I will insert a bookmark such as EMMA software 1st use. If I discover later that the author defines the EMMA acronym, I can easily move the definition to the first-use location. If the document is fiction, I might bookmark Jason blue eyes or Konowitz 1st use or Katydid Gorylla spelling.

Moving a bookmark

Moving a bookmark from page 3 to page 55 is easy — just two mouse clicks: select the bookmark to be moved and click Move Here (#4); the bookmark will be moved from wherever it is in the document to where your cursor is currently located in the document. Unlike with Word’s system, there is no need to delete the bookmark and retype the name and add it again. This is particularly useful for my editing stopped here bookmark. I use that bookmark to indicate my current location in the document when I need to go to another location, for example, to table 5: I move the editing stopped here bookmark to my current location, select the table 5 bookmark, and click Go To. When I am ready to return to where I had been in the document before going to table 5, I select my editing stopped here bookmark and click Go To. (A bookmarking tip: I have learned that the best way to number tables and figures is to use two digits, such as table 05, rather than the single digit shown in the image. The reason is that if there are 10 or more figures or tables, using the leading zero ensures that the tables and figures are listed in number order.)

PerfectIt users

If you are a PerfectIt user, Bookmarks offers you an easy way to set the area that PerfectIt should check: beginning and ending bookmarks (#6). Click on PSTART to insert a bookmark where PerfectIt should begin and PEND to insert an ending bookmark. When you run PerfectIt, it will search and report on the text between the two bookmarks. For more information, see PerfectIts’ Help files.

Keeping the dialog open

Another features of EditTools’ Bookmarks is the ability to keep the dialog open (#5). In Word, the bookmark dialog closes automatically. In EditTools, you have a choice (#5). I like keeping the dialog open because I am constantly accessing bookmarks (I keep the Bookmarks, Click List, and Reference # Order Check dialogs open; they fit side-by-side on my portrait-oriented monitor). But if you prefer closing and reopening the dialog as needed, you have two choices: You can click Bookmarks on the EditTools tab (black arrow below) or you can assign Bookmarks to a “hotkey” combination by clicking Hotkeys on the EditTools tab (red arrow).

Bookmarks on the EditTools Ribbon

Renaming a bookmark

I use bookmarks to track callouts of figures and tables (and anything else that needs special attention, such as formulas). With Word’s bookmark system, this was doable but time-consuming and prone to error. Of course, another way to do it is the old-fashioned paper-and-pen method, but Bookmarks is much more efficient and reduces the chance of error.

As mentioned earlier, I assign a bookmark to each figure and table legend before I begin editing. When I come to the first callout for table 1, for example, my procedure is as follows:

Renaming a Bookmark

 

 

1. I move (or insert if it hasn’t been previously created) my editing stopped here bookmark (green arrow) at the location of the callout in the text.
2. Next, I select the appropriate preassigned bookmark, table 1 (red arrow), and click Go To (blue arrow) to take me to table 1.
3. I edit table 1.
4. When I am done editing table 1, I select the table 1 bookmark (red arrow) and click Rename (black arrow) to open the Rename dialog, shown here:

 

Changing the Name

The Rename dialog shows the current name (#1) and includes that name in the To: (or rename) field (#2). I have chosen for the name to reappear in the To: field by choosing No (#3). If I had chosen Yes as my default, then the To: field would be blank.

After editing table 1, I want to rename the bookmark so that I know (a) I have edited it and (b) it has already been called out in the document. However, I may need to look at the table again, so I want table 1 to keep a bookmark. Consequently, what I do is add an x as a prefix to the current name, as shown here (#4); however, the bookmark’s renaming is not limited to the x I use — it can be anything that works for you:

 

The New Name

When I click OK (#5), the bookmark remains in place in the document but is renamed to x table 1 as shown in the image below (blue arrow). The bookmark now moves to the end of the list and from looking at the Bookmarks dialog, I can tell that table 1 has been called out in the text and has been edited, and that the next table callout in the text should be for table 2.

 

In the Bookmarks dialog

To return to where I was in the document before going to table 1, I select editing stopped here (black arrow) and click Go To (#6).

For a better idea of how I make use of the Bookmarks macro, look at the image below. I can see that the next table callout should be for table 3 (#1), that tables 1 and 2 (#2) and figures 1 to 3 (#4) have been edited and called out, and that figure 4 (#3) and tables 3 to 8 (#1) have yet to be called out.

 

Using Bookmarks to track

If the next callout I encounter is for table 5, I can see at a glance that table 5 is not being called out in number order, which allows me to renumber or query, depending on my client’s instructions. If I renumber, I can move or rename the bookmarks.

As you can see, EditTools’ Bookmarks makes bookmarking easy. Because it is an efficient way to use bookmarks, I can make more and better use of a valuable editing and navigating tool. Most importantly, because it is efficient and a timesaver, Bookmarks saves me time, which means enhanced profitability. Bookmarks is one of the three macros I keep open on my desktop as I edit, the other two being Click List and Reference # Order Check.

Richard Adin, An American Editor

Related An American Editor essays are:

• The Business of Editing: Correcting “Errors”
• The Business of Editing: Journals, References, & Dollars
• The Business of Editing: Making Search & Replace Efficient & Profitable
• The Business of Editing: Coding for Profit
• The Business of Editing: Managing Comments with Comment Editor
• The Business of Editing: Clicking for Profit with Click List
• The Business of Editing: Keeping Reference Callouts in Number Order

____________

Looking for a Deal?

You can buy EditTools in a package with PerfectIt and Editor’s Toolkit at a special savings of $78 off the price if bought individually. To purchase the package at the special deal price, click Editor’s Toolkit Ultimate.

Worth Noting: New Macros, New Version — EditTools 6.2 Released

EditTools 6.2 has been released.

The new release has a much speedier Journals macro (thanks to a suggestion from Shmuel Gerber). Recall that in The Business of Editing: Cite Work Can Be Profitable, I mentioned how I had just finished working on a reference list of 1,827 that took the Journals macro, with my then dataset of 78,000 entries, not quite 4 hours to complete. With the improvement suggested by Mr. Gerber, it took less than 2 hours with a dataset of 98,000 entries. A more typical reference list of about 75 references takes a little less than a minute to check against the dataset.

Version 6.2 also has several new macros and one significantly improved macro.

The new macros are Bookmarks, Click List, Comment Editor, and Reference # Order Check. The Insert Query macro has received a great new addition called Categories. Categories lets you organize your standard comments for quicker access. Each macro is described at the EditTools website and will be the subject of an upcoming in-depth essay here at AAE. The AAE essays will discuss not only how the macros work but how they can increase your profitability.

The Bookmarks macro has one additional feature aimed at PerfectIt users. It provide a quick-and-easy way to insert special bookmarks in a Word document that tell PerfectIt what text you want checked.

EditTools 6.2 is a free upgrade for registered users. Go to the downloads page to obtain your copy. If you aren’t using EditTools, try it. Go to the downloads page and download the trial version.

(NOTE: EditTools 6.2 requires 32-bit Word 2007 or newer. If you are currently running EditTools 6.x, you can run version 6.2.)

Rich Adin, An American Editor