Creating a Mirrored Layout in Word

While a lot of a writer's efforts will end up in a webpage template or some other layout guide, being able to create attractive and readable pages is still a vital part of a technical writer's skill set.

Check out this image of a word document. Notice the mirrored margins, and the fly-out titles. Your eyes like this page, it's attractive and invites the reader in.

 
Here's how you create this in Microsoft Word. These settings should work in all versions of Word.

Margins

Set your left and right margins generously. Set two inch margins on the left and right; and one inch margins on the top and bottom. Set the Multiple Pages drop down to Mirror margins. Everything else is left at default.

Margins: Top, 1; bottom, 1; right, 2; left, 2.

Multiple pages: Mirror margins.

 

New Style: Side Heading

Next, create a new style. Call it Side Heading (or whatever makes most sense for you.) Set the Font options to whatever you like for a title style. Set the paragraph options for whatever you like in a title style. Frame settings are the second option that makes the mirrored look works.

From the Modify Style window, select Frame from the Format button. Enter the settings as given below. Once you have this style working, you can tweak it to make it work for you.

Text wrapping: Around

Width: Exactly At: 1.2

Horizontal

Position: Outside Relative to: Page

Distance from text: .1

Move with text (checked)

Give it a try. Apply the Side style first and type a title, then type a normal paragraph below it. On the sample I've justified the normal paragraphs to give the page a nice structured feel. I've used Microsoft's default heading styles, which I normally change but didn't for this sample.

If you have questions or I didn't make something clear, please post and let me know. I prefer praise, but the occasional bit of constructive criticism is a good thing.

Introductions

Welcome to my career blog.

It's a whole new ball game where careers and job searching are concerned. It used to be that when you looked for a job, you scanned the classifieds of a newspaper and mailed in your resume to the company. Wow. Now, not only do you search with the help of the internet and electronic files, but social networking sites are a must. It's all about visibility.

Look here for my insights on technical communication. With 20+ years of experience in this field, I've learned a few tricks.

About Me

John Heeder is a documentation specialist and senior technical writer with 20 years experience in all facets of creating documentation. With skills and experience as writer, editor, graphic designer, software trainer, and web designer, John has both created and edited documents in multiple media for multiple audiences. John has created printed manuals, Adobe PDFs, web sites, online help systems, training videos, scripts, and more.

He is skilled with current software tools for documentation creation. This includes Microsoft Office and Adobe Corporation products. He is also a quick learner, easily getting up to speed on new software products; both tools used to create documentation, and applications being documented.

John has worked both as a team member and as a solo writer. He has managed several projects to successful completion as a team leader. He's also been the sole writer on other projects. John has worked on and completed projects of both large and small scope.

John's focus is on software development, educational development, hardware documentation, and marketing writing.

He has also been successful in entertainment writing with a novel published and a children's TV show in production. With a professional attitude and approach, John is a productive writer and valued team member.