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Subject:Re: Gerunds in titles and headings From:Laurel Nelson <Laurel_Y_Nelson -at- NOTES -dot- SEAGATE -dot- COM> Date:Tue, 12 Jan 1999 12:29:26 -0600
Carolyn: Take a look at Word Help. For both Word 7.0 and Word 97, the Help
index uses gerunds, but the topic titles are not in the gerund format. For
instance, the Help index displays *borders, changing,* but this index
selection points to topics that all begin with *Change a Border....*
For a Help project that I worked on in 1994, the Help designer had us
follow the same topic and index structure that Word uses. All of the links
to a topic began with a gerund, but the actual topic title was in the
imperative form. (This was Help for Windows 3.1.) Using these two verb
forms was more work for us because we had to check and double-check
everything to ensure that all of the topics and links were formatted
correctly, and I don't know if all of the extra work was worth it.
If you use the imperative form in the topics, what are you going to do for
the index--use the gerund form? Using the two different verb forms will be
more work for you.
