Google Docs Fundamentals

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Google Docs Fundamentals Block Paragraphs Let’s begin by setting our normal text style. Select a font and font size for your body text. In my example I’ll stay with Arial 11 point font. Most people use Times New Roman or Georgia 12 point font. This font and size is easy to read. Once you’ve updated the body text font and size, select update normal text to match. Let’s work on the paragraph. Go to the menu and select format. Go down the list of options to line spacing. In the options menu for line spacing, select custom spacing. A line spacing customization box will open with options to change the spacing before or after paragraphs. In the box that reads ‘after’, enter the number 6. Why six? We set our font size to 12 points. If we were to press the enter key twice we would have a space of 12 points plus some additional space above and below the line so we don’t crowd the letters like g or q, which have descenders. The tails that make the letter g and the letter q are descenders because they go below the imaginary line where all the other letters sit. That leaves a large space between paragraphs. If we enter the number 6, we are telling the word processor to use 6 points instead of 12 points for a line once we hit the return key. When we do this there is still space used by the font for descenders, and enough space between paragraphs to know there are separate paragraphs. Without going into a lot of detail that’s the basic reason for setting this paragraph styling option. After you type the number 6, click the ‘apply’ button. Type a few lines of text for a paragraph and press the enter key once. Type a few more lines for the next paragraph. Notice the spacing between paragraphs. Google Doc styles does not keep this information as part of the normal text style. The good news is that if you create this style in a document it’s automatically applied it to all the text in the document. 11 Digital Maestro
Google Docs Fundamentals Indented Paragraphs Paragraphs with indented first lines are much easier to setup. Keep in mind that extra space after a paragraph is used to separate paragraphs. First line indents are used to indicate the start of a new paragraph. Using a first line indent and extra space between paragraphs is too much. When using first line indents, don’t use extra space between paragraphs. To create the first line indent in paragraphs we’ll use the ruler. In the ruler there are two shapes. The upside down triangle is used to set the left indent. The left indent will indent all the text in a paragraph. Above the upside down triangle is a small bar. This is used to set the first line indent. It recognizes the first line in a paragraph and applies the indent to the first line. In my example you’ll see the first letter of the paragraph is above the third letter of the sentence below. That’s all you need to do to set the first paragraph indent. All paragraphs you create from this point will have the same first line indent. Click and drag the rectangle to the right. As you move the rectangle it will snap to points on the ruler. Move it until it snaps to one point then to another. This should now place your first line indent two character spaces into the paragraph. Here’s something to keep in mind. The first paragraph is not indented. Indents are used to show the start of a paragraph. You don’t need to show that the first paragraph is a paragraph. I hope that makes sense. Google Docs is still a little primitive in what it can do compared to industry standards like Microsoft Word. You will need to help it along. If you’ll be using block paragraphs then you can set the font, font size and spacing after paragraphs. Once this is done all you need to do is compose your content. If you’ll be using first line indents, you can set the font and font size. Write your first paragraph and when you are ready to write your second paragraph, set the first line indent. From this point forward the first line of the paragraph will automatically be indented. Digital Maestro 12
Page 1 and 2: Digital Maestro Magazine Google Doc
Page 3 and 4: Google Docs Fundamentals What is Go
Page 5 and 6: Google Docs Fundamentals Start At T
Page 7 and 8: Google Docs Fundamentals Web Fonts
Page 9 and 10: Google Docs Fundamentals Formatting
Page 11: Google Docs Fundamentals Formatting
Page 15 and 16: Google Docs Fundamentals Image Plac
Page 17 and 18: Google Docs Fundamentals Image Plac
Page 19 and 20: Google Docs Fundamentals Adding Ima
Page 21 and 22: Google Docs Fundamentals Cropping I
Page 23 and 24: Google Docs Fundamentals Cropping I
Page 25 and 26: Google Docs Fundamentals Other Imag
Page 27 and 28: Google Docs Fundamentals Tables Tab
Page 29 and 30: Google Docs Fundamentals Tables Onc
Page 31 and 32: Google Docs Fundamentals Share and
Page 33 and 34: Google Docs Fundamentals Share and
Page 35 and 36: Google Docs Fundamentals About Font
Page 37: Google Docs Fundamentals Copyright,

Google Docs Fundamentals

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?