Sonia Jaffe Robbins, Editing Workshop, G54.1123

home | syllabus | weekly assignments | e-resources | site map

EDITING PROCEDURES

Wherever you work, there will be certain procedures copy editors are expected to follow: e.g., where stories are saved, how stories are named, how you indicate your changes, how you make queries. Below are the procedures for this class.

Stories for editing will always be found in the class folder dated the week of the class. As soon as you open a story for editing, you must IMMEDIATELY save it in the class folder. Save the story according to the following convention:

storyslug.your initials< >example switzer.sjr

SAVE YOUR STORY REGULARLY AS YOU EDIT.

Before You Begin to Edit

  1. Go to Tools menu and click on Options.
  2. Click on Spelling & Grammar tab.
  3. Click any boxes that have check marks in them, to delete check mark and leave box blank. (In other words, you do NOT want to have spelling or grammar "checked" as you type, or to have any corrections suggested.)
  4. Still in the Options window, click on the Track Changes tab.
  5. Click on Underline for Inserted Text, Strikethrough for Deleted Text, and click (none) for Changed Formatting and for Changed Lines. Click on Gray-25% for deleted text. Choose any dark color for inserted text.
  6. Click OK for Options.
  7. Go to Tools menu and click on Track Changes.
  8. Click on Highlight Changes.
  9. Make sure all three boxes have check marks in them.

SAVE YOUR STORY REGULARLY AS YOU EDIT.

As You Are Editing

Editors must be able to justify their changes. In many newspaper or magazine systems, there is a way to type a query to the writer or explain a change in a format that will never turn up in type. Since we don't have this format on our system, type any query or explanation for a change in bold and in square brackets.

If you make a change and decide you want to undo that change after you've made several other changes.

  1. Highlight the change(s) you want to undo.
  2. Go to Track Changes under Tools menu.
  3. Click on Accept or Reject Changes.
  4. Click on the Reject button at bottom of window. (You may need to click Reject more than once if you made more than one change.)

SAVE YOUR STORY REGULARLY AS YOU EDIT.

Standard Changes for All Stories

  1. Do a Find/Replace to ensure that there is only one space between each word and between sentences.
  2. Do a Find/Replace to ensure that paragraphs are indented with the Tab mark, not simply with spaces. (In real working conditions, your publication's program will probably have the paragraph indent formatted automatically, and you will not use the Tab key to indent grafs. For this class, you will need to Tab to indent, so your printout will have properly indented grafs. If you start your own publication, AVOID block paragraphs with space between them. Block paragraphs are visually distracting, create disjointed thoughts, and break up arguments in an artificial way.)

SAVE YOUR STORY REGULARLY AS YOU EDIT.

After You Finish Editing

When you are finished editing, or when class time is up, whichever comes first, print out your edit and leave it with me. Always DOUBLE SPACE your edit before printing. I will not accept single-spaced edits. To double space:
  1. Highlight the entire story.
  2. Click on Format menu.
  3. Click on Paragraph.
  4. Under linespacing, click on down arrow, then click on Double. (This will double-space the entire story.)
  5. Click OK to close window.
  6. Make sure your name is on the story, either typed or handwritten.

SAVE YOUR STORY REGULARLY AS YOU EDIT.

When class time is up, editing time is up. The end of class is the equivalent of presstime.

Watch Fors

Whether you are editing for print or for the Web, the "errors" below occasionally crop up, sometimes because stories don't adequately convert from e-mail, sometimes because of old typing habits, sometimes for whatever reason. Learn to train your eyes to see them. (Some of these cannot be adequately shown on the Web.)

Error Replace with
the letter O the number zero (0)
the number zero (0) the letter O
the letter l the number 1

Below are "errors" only when you are editing for print.
Error Replace with
asterisksbullets
two hyphensem-dash
hyphen in range of numbersen-dash
Straight quotesSmart quotes
open single quotes (`98) in shortened
dates or words (rock 'n' roll)		apostrophe*
*You have to play a trick on the computer to make the apostrophe at the beginning of a word not look like an open single quote. Type the apostrophe twice -- you'll see that the second one is oriented correctly. Then go back and delete the first (incorrect) one.

When a single quote is immediately followed by a double quote, insert a "thin space" between the characters by pressing Shift+CTRL+spacebar. (You'll see a tiny circle, like the degree symbol, between the single and double quote if you click on the Show Paragraph button on the menu bar.)

Last revision: January 16, 2005

Sonia Jaffe Robbins (c) 1996-2005