Today I want to return to a question I answered a few months ago on finding the appropriate level of granularity in an index. Within that question was the comment, “too many subheadings with the same locator is a red flag.” That comment has stuck with me. It is true… Read More »Repeating Locators Within an Array
Welcome to another Q&A, on this last Tuesday of the month. Today’s question comes from Winona, and references a previous reflection I wrote. Winona asks: In your post on the subjective side of indexing, you write that two indexers can produce different indexes for the same book, but that there… Read More »Q&A: How to Quantify Subjectivity Across Indexes?
Welcome back to another Q&A on this last Tuesday of the month. Today’s question is a little different in that it comes from a subcontractor I work with. The question was asked in response to a specific piece of advice that I gave for a previous project we worked on… Read More »Q&A: When to Draw Indexable Terms Directly from the Text?
It’s time to dig into cross-references again, picking up where I left off two weeks ago. If you missed that first reflection, you can read it here. I had a lot more to write than I initially thought about how I use, or don’t use, cross-references, which is why I… Read More »How I Use Cross-References (Part 2)
I’m currently indexing a history of nuclear reactors. It is about 300,000 words. Meticulously researched and written, with a strong narrative. It is a big book, and it is taking a while to get through. It is also not the only large volume I’ve indexed this year. I feel like… Read More »Indexing Big Books
Welcome back to another Q&A, on the last Tuesday of the month. How are we already at the end of April? Today’s question is about granularity: How should I judge what level of granular information the reader will be looking for? Too many subheadings with the same locator is a… Read More »Q&A: Finding the Right Level of Granularity
I’ve written before about subheadings, most recently here and here. And I’ve been reflecting on them again. Subheadings are a crucial tool for breaking down large discussions and for differentiating nuances. More can definitely be written, looking at different contexts and scenarios. Recently, I’ve been thinking about how subheadings can… Read More »Repeating and Reusing Subheadings
Welcome back to the third edition of the monthly Q&A, on the last Tuesday(ish) of every month. Today’s question comes from Kimberly: I’ve been giving each heading a subheading right from the start, with the idea that it might be easier to delete unneeded ones than to go back and… Read More »Q&A: Preemptive Subheadings?
I’m adding a new Q&A element for my newsletter subscribers. I will respond to a new question on the last Tuesday of every month. To kick off this new Q&A, here is a question about subheadings. To summarize, “How can I become faster and more decisive when writing subheadings? I… Read More »Q&A: How Can I be Faster and More Decisive Writing Subheadings?
In my last post I wrote about entries and arrays, which I described as the building blocks of an index. I defined an entry as “what this thing is + where to find it.” Today I’m going to expand on “what this thing is,” also known as main headings and… Read More »Telling Readers What This Thing Is