Re:The printing of titles on book spines
by droithomme on Saturday June 03, 2017 @03:03PM
(#14477891)
It's easier to find books by title on the shelves of a French bookstore or library than an English/American one. The titles are justified evenly with the shelving. So you can scan along the shelf looking for your title once you are in the right section. With the English system, the title text starts at a different level, the height of the book. It is less efficient to scan.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
In the picture, the French titles were centred, not aligned to the bottom of the spine. For other examples, see https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/z/old-french-vintage-books-bac... or https://fthmb.tqn.com/NV9mch-OuUErSxkoCWCk9PkPvvY=/768x0/fil...
/about/88006976-56a2e49d3df78cf7727b0095.jpg){kind=link}
This seems orthogonal from the top/bottom orientation though, no?
Nope, because bottom-to-top all titles start roughly at the same height (the bottom of the spine), while top-to-bottom they start higher on higher books.
Still seems orthogonal to me though. Why couldn't all top-to-bottom titles start at the top of the spine, and similarly be justified?
Because the words wouldn't start at the same height. The point was that, if every title starts at the same height it's easier to skim, because you don't have to move your eyes much when looking at the first few letters.
So make them all start at the same height, at the top of the spine? What exactly about top-to-bottom orientation do you think precludes proper justification? You're still on about something orthogonal, the justification along the spine, which isn't affected by the overall orientation.
Also, someone posted photos of French bookshelves showing that their centers tend to be centered like ours are, so it's not any more readable. If you think of the spines as advertisements on bookstore shelves then this makes sense.