Instructions for Submitting the Electronic Format of your
Manuscript
The instructions will guide you through preparing and delivering
the electronic format of your manuscript for the CD-ROM.
Submitted papers will be converted to the Adobe Portable Document
Format (PDF), an open cross-platform file format that preserves the
original look of documents across a wide variety of computer
platforms, printers, and electronic distribution methods. The
converted papers will be bundled with viewing software for
distribution on CD-ROM.
Please read the detailed instructions that follow before starting,
taking particular note of preferred fonts, formats, and delivery
options. The quality of the finished product is very dependent upon
receiving your help at this stage of the publication process.
Producing Your Paper
Index:
Acceptable Formats
Generating Postscript Files
Application Specific Files
More On Fonts
Including Graphics/Images
Compressing Your Submission
Submitting Your Paper
Check List
Acceptable Formats
Papers can be submitted in one or more of the following formats,
listed in order of preference. Please include a second format if
possible (i.e. postscript and the original Microsoft Word document to
assist if there is trouble during the conversion process.
- Postscript (.PS)
- Rich Text Format (.RTF)
- Application Specific Formats
In addition to the generic formats listed, you can also submit
your files in any of the following application specific formats:
- Adobe Acrobat
- Ami Pro
- Claris Works
- CorelDraw
- FrameMaker
- Freelance
- Harvard Graphics
- (La)TeX
- MacWrite
- Pagemaker
- PowerPoint
- Quark Express
- Troff
- Ventura Publisher
- Word Pro
- Word
- WordPerfect
If you are unable to submit your paper in any of the electronic
formats or if we encounter problems converting your electronic
submission, your paper will be scanned for inclusion on the CD.
Although a scanned paper looks identical to the original when
printed, it is slower and more difficult to view on screen. If you do
plan to deliver your paper by hardcopy, avoid type faces smaller than
10 points and avoid using color.
Generating Postscript
Files
Almost all applications/systems can produce a suitable postscript
file although this is accomplished in a wide variety of ways. In all
cases the quality of your postscript file will have a direct impact
on the quality of the converted file. A high quality postscript file
is one that reliably produces pages with the desired look as
efficiently as possible.
Suggestions for producing your postscript file include the
following.
- Make sure that your submitted paper prints correctly to a
postscript printer. Files that cannot be printed usually cannot be
converted. Always use the latest version of your postscript driver
and select Postscript Level 2 if available.
- Use only base fonts and embed all fonts in your postscript
file as discussed in the More On Fonts section. If you are using a
Windows system select "Use Printer Fonts for all TrueType Fonts"
in the "Advanced Options" dialog box for the postscript printer
driver.
- Embed all images and figures.
- Design your document using color and select a color printer to
create your Postscript file. Note that many applications create
color data only when printing to a color printer and will create a
greyscale document unless a color printer is selected.
- Do not use custom halftones and pattern fills. Instead use
solid-color or greyscale fills to produce a more readable document
on-screen that will also load and print significantly faster.
- Do not select "Smooth Graphics". This option often produces
extremely large files that will take a long time to display and
print. The Smooth Graphics option is usually found in the Page
Setup Dialog box in Macintosh applications and some Windows
applications (i.e. Quark Express).
Application Specific
Files
Always save application specific files using the default file
extension (i.e. PPT for PowerPoint) and include any other required
files such as style sheets and any documents included by reference.
If possible, also submit a postscript or rich text format version of
your paper as well.
More On Fonts
The following fonts are considered "base fonts" and you are
encouraged to limit your font selections to this list. These fonts
are automatically installed with the viewing software and made
available to all papers included on the published CD without having
to be included within individual PDF files.
- Courier
- Courier-Bold
- Courier-Oblique
- Courier-BoldOblique
- Helvetica
- Helvetica-Bold
- Helvetica-Oblique
- Helvetica-BoldOblique
- Symbol
- Times
- Times-Bold
- Times-Oblique
- Times-BoldOblique
- ZapfDingbats
Using these fonts will reduce the size of your converted paper as
well as speed up the display andprinting of your paper for the
readers. Additionally using only the specified fonts provides a
consistent look across to all material on the published CD.
If you decide to use fonts other than "base fonts" you must submit
your paper as a postscript file with embedded fonts. The embedded
fonts will be preserved during the conversion process.
Including Graphics/Images
The type of graphics you include will affect the quality and size
of your paper on the electronic conference proceedings disc. In
general, the use of vector graphics such as those produced by most
presentation and drawing packages (i.e. Visio, PowerPoint, Freehand)
can be used without concern and is encouraged.
Bitmap images such as those produced when a photograph is scanned,
requires significant storage space and must be used with care. Bitmap
graphics store an image as a series of numbers that represent the
color of each dot in the image. Increasing the dimensions, resolution
(dots per inch), or number of colors in an image will dramatically
increase the storage size of the image. If your paper contains many
large images, they will be downsampled to reduce their size during
the conversion process. However, the automated process used will not
always produce the best image, and you are encouraged to perform this
yourself on an image by image basis.
Suggestions for improving the quality of bitmap graphics include
the following.
- In general bitmapped images should be limited to no more than
256 (8 bit) color/greyscale, 300 dpi and should be kept as small
as possible.
- Reduce the number of display colors before making screen
shots. The majority of computer applications use less than 16
colors for their menus, dialogs etc.
- Select higher resolutions for images that a reader will
magnify. Image resolution does not increase when readers zoom in
on an image.
All images should be embedded into your document.
Compressing Your
Submission
Submitting your material is quicker and easier if all of the files
are collected into a single archive using one of the following
formats:
- Pkzip (.zip)
- Tar (.tar)
- StuffIt (.sit)
- GNU Zip (.gz)
- Compress (.z).
Submitting Your Paper
Send 3 1/2 or 5 1/4 in Macintosh or PC formatted floppy disks, a
completed copyright form, and two camera-ready copies of your paper
to Jerry Hudgins, Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, 29208 USA.
Check List
- Two camera ready copies of your manuscript
- Floppy disk: labeled with
- Title
- Authors
- Paper Number
- Operating system
- Software
- Copyright form
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