The appearance of characters is dependent on their character attributes. The most common character attributes are font, type style and size.
To apply character attributes to a block of text, simply select the text and then set the character attributes. To apply character attributes to the next text you type, place the insertion point, set the character attributes and then type.
To change one character attribute for selected text: Select the text to change with the Text tool. Choose the appropriate Type menu command or select its equivalent from the Character view of the Edit palette.
To change multiple character attributes at once for selected text: Select the text to change with the Text tool. Choose Attributes from the Type menu. Change the text attributes and click OK.
If you want to change the character attributes of many small blocks of text, you should consider using character styles to save time.
To change character attributes for all text formatted with a character style: Hold down Shift while choosing a style from the Character Styles submenu in the Type menu to display the Character Style dialog box. Modify the attributes and click OK. All text formatted with that style will change automatically.
MacOS users: Hold down Shift prior to pressing the mouse button.
| Type Menu Command | Description |
| Font | Choose the font from the submenu. Amiga users: Choose a font from the dialog box displayed by this command. |
| Size | Choose a preset size from the submenu. Choose Other to enter a custom size. |
| Width | Choose a preset horizontal scale from the submenu. Choose Other to enter a custom horizontal scale. Width is measured as a percentage of the designed width. |
| Type Style | Choose a type style from the submenu. Choose Set Type Style to select multiple styles at once. Plain deselects all other type styles. Superscript and subscript are mutually exclusive and selecting one will toggle off the other. |
| Line & Fill | Choose to set the line, fill and color. |
| Tracking | Choose to adjust character and word spacing. |
| Leading | Choose to adjust line spacing. |
The Font submenu (or dialog box with AmigaOS) allows you to select an installed font to apply to text.
The Size submenu allows you to select a preset or custom type size. You can set type at sizes up to 79,200pt. The Width submenu allows you to scale text horizontally from 1 to 650% in .01% increments. Changing the width by more than a small amount can distort the character designs.
The Type Style submenu lets you choose designed and applied type styles. Designed styles are separate font files. For example, Times Italic is a designed style of the Times family. If you select Italic when Times Roman (Normal) is set, Times Italic will be used if available. The selected font will still be Times, but PageStream will use the Times Italic font to display the text. If Times Italic is not available, PageStream will italicize the normal style.
All of the Type Style commands except Normal and Bold will open a requester if you hold down a Shift key so that you can configure them. For example, the Superscript requestor allows you to set the scale and offset for the superscript text.
Choose Set Type Style from the Type Style submenu to display the Type Style dialog box. The Browse (>>) buttons allow you to customize styles. Refer to the table on the next page, for more information.
| Type Style | Description |
| Italic | Check to use the italic style of the font. If the font lacks an italic weight, PageStream will slant the text 15. To change the slant angle, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Italic requester. |
| Underline | Check to underline the text. To change the underline offset and stroke color and width, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Underline requester. |
| Outline | Check to change the fill of the text to white and the outline of the text to black. To change the fill color and stroke color and width, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Outline requester. |
| Shadow | Check to place a 50% grey shadow slightly offset down and to the right of the text. To change the shadow color, offset and slant, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Shadow requester. |
| Reverse | Check to reverse the fill and background colors of the text. To change the reverse color and the amount of background that is reversed, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Reverse requester. |
| Small Caps | Check to use the small caps or titling caps style of the font. If the font lacks a small caps style, PageStream will scale the text to 80% of its normal height and will force the text to uppercase. To change the horizontal and vertical scale, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Small Caps requester. |
| Superscript | Check to superscript the text. The default superscript style scales the text by 60% and offsets it upwards by 40%. To change the superscript scale and offset, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Superscript requester. |
| Subscript | Check to subscript the text. The default subscript style scales the text by 60% and offsets it downwards by 40%. To change the subscript scale and offset, click on the Browse (>>) button to open the Subscript requester. |
The Line & Fill command displays a dialog box to set text line, fill and color attributes. It is identical to the Object menu Line & Fill command for object attributes. Refer to Chapter 6: Line, Fill & Color, for more information.
Tracking adjusts the space to the right of each character. Increasing the tracking increases the amount of space between all text, regardless of its character and word spacing, and thus brightens a page. Decreasing the tracking reduces the space between all text and darkens a page.
PageStream offers five predefined tracking tables ranging from Very Loose to Very Tight. The tracking amount when you apply a tracking table depends on the type size; large sizes are tracked more tightly than small sizes. For example, the Normal track adds 0.01 ems between characters at 8 points and removes 0.02 ems at 24 points. No space is added or removed at 12 points. One em is equal to the size, so adding 0.01 ems to 8 point type adds 0.08 points of space.
Select None to avoid using a preset tracking table. You can enter a custom tracking value if desired, and even use both a preset track and a custom value.
To change the tracking: Choose Tracking from the Type menu to display the Tracking dialog box, or use the Character view of the Edit palette. Select a preset track from the Set Tracking pop-up menu. Enter a custom track amount in 1/100ths of an em.
You can also adjust tracking with keyboard shortcuts for selected text. If text is not selected, the characters at the insertion point will be manually kerned.
| To do | Select text and press (Option = Alt) |
| Increase tracking by 0.05em | Control ] (right bracket) |
| Increase tracking by 0.01em | Control-Option ] (right bracket) |
| Decrease tracking by 0.01em | Control-Option [ (left bracket) |
| Decrease tracking by 0.05em | Control [ (left bracket) |
Character spacing allows you to adjust the space surrounding each character. Each character in a font is designed with a certain amount of space around it. You can increase or decrease this space with character spacing.
Word spacing allows you to adjust the space surrounding each word. The space character in each font determines the size of the space between words. You can increase or decrease this space with word spacing.
PageStream allows you to specify minimum, optimum and maximum values for character and word spacing. If your text is unjustified (blocked left, right or centered), the only values which apply are the optimum values. Zero percent optimum character spacing uses the font's designed spacing. Positive values increase the space around the characters and negative values decrease the space. 100% optimum word spacing uses the font's designed width for the space character. Larger values increase the size of the space and smaller values decrease the space.
If your text is justified, PageStream will attempt to space characters and words to match the optimum values. It will be unable to match the optimum value and will have to add or remove small amounts of space.
You can set the minimum and maximum amount of space that PageStream can add or remove between characters and words in justified text. PageStream never spaces characters or words closer than the minimum values, but it may exceed the maximum values if there is no other way to justify the text.
To set character spacing: Choose Tracking from the Type menu to display the Tracking dialog box. Enter the minimum, optimum and maximum character spacing values. You cannot enter a minimum of less than 300% or a maximum greater than 300%. The minimum must be less than or equal to the optimum, which must be less than or equal to the maximum.
To set word spacing: Choose Tracking from the Type menu to display the Tracking dialog box. Enter the minimum, optimum and maximum word spacing values. You cannot enter a minimum of less than 0% or a maximum of greater than 650%, and the minimum must be less than or equal to the optimum, which must be less than or equal to the maximum.
Leading is the space between lines of text. PageStream allows you to set the amount of leading, how leading is measured, and how lines are positioned. There are three ways to measure leading in PageStream:
In general, the amount of space added between each line of body type should be about 20% of the type size. If you use relative leading this would be 120%. You can apply leading to any amount of text, but PageStream uses the leading of the first character on each line. You should normally set leading for paragraphs instead of smaller blocks of text.
To set the leading amount and how it is measured: Choose Leading from the Type menu to display the Leading dialog box, or use the Character view of the Edit palette. Select how to measure leading from the Type pop-up menu. Enter the leading value into the Amount text box.
The horizontal bar in which a line of text is positioned is called a slug. It is the total of the text and its line spacing. The top of each slug is immediately below the slug above it. The slug is shown as a black box on this page, which is how it appears when you select a line of text.
There are four methods for positioning lines of text within their slugs:
Most people will not need to change the leading mode and can just use the Proportional default.
To change the leading mode: Choose Leading from the Type menu to display the Leading dialog box. Select a leading method from the Mode pop-up menu. For Custom leading, enter an amount in the text box below. Click OK.