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What to Include and Not Include in the Front Matter

A large amount of the front matter content that appears in typeset USGS documents is static, or boilerplate, text. Further, several components of the front matter are duplicated in the final PDF; for example, the document title and authors appear more than once on different pages in the front matter. eXtyles can automatically generate much of the front matter boilerplate content, and in an XML workflow it is not best practice to avoid duplicate content (that is, have the same thing appear in more than one place). Because of this, when using eXtyles the front matter in the USGS Word documents is greatly simplified.


Panel
titleIn this section

Table of Contents


Include

Title Page

The associated example shows how the title page of a typical USGS document is organized in eXtyles. Note that only the following elements are retained:

  • USGS logo (not required, but can be retained if desired)
  • Document title for the Suggested Citation (note the sentence-style capitalization)
  • Document title for the Running Head (note the shortened length)
  • Cooperator statement, if provided
  • Program note information, if provided
  • document Document title
  • document Document authors
  • author affiliationsAuthor affiliations, if provided
Note
titleA note about the Suggested Citation and Running Head

Despite the XML best practice to avoid duplicate content, to ensure the accurate automated layout of content in InDesign using Typefi, some content must be provided in more than one place; specifically, the document title, the suggested citation, and the running head.

These three versions of the document title are, in fact, slightly different from one another: the suggested citation follows different capitalization rules and the running head is often a shorter version of the title. Because of this, the document title will need to appear in more than one place on the title page, as shown in the example.

Other Front Matter

If present, the following front matter elements are also retained:

  • List of Plates, Maps (or other objects that do not appear in the Word document)
  • Foreword
  • Preface
  • Acknowledgments
  • Conversion Factors
  • Datum Statements
  • Abbreviations

See USGS Styles for more information about how to style these front matter sections.

Note
titleA note about the List of Plates, Maps, and so on

Occasionally the table of contents for a USGS publication will include a list of objects that do not also appear in the Word document (e.g., maps, plates, etc.). This is distinct from TOC lists of figures and tables, the captions and titles of which are also included in the Word document. Therefore, to ensure that these lists of objects are included in the PDF, they must be included in the front matter of the document.

Do Not Include

Boilerplate Content

Boilerplate content–that is, content that remains static across documents, such as information about the Secretary of the Interior and the USGS Director–will be added to the XML during export. Because of this, boilerplate content should be removed from the Word document.

In USGS documents, boilerplate content includes:

  • U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary and USGS Director information
  • USGS address
  • USGS "for more information" content
  • USGS copyright statement
  • ISBNs and/or ISSNs
Image Removed

Suggested Citation

Following XML best practice to avoid duplicate content, the suggested citation should be removed from the Word document. It can be constructed during layout from existing metadata (e.g., publication year) and information in the Word document (e.g., title and authors).
Image Added

Table of Contents / List of Figures and Tables

The document's table of contents is best generated from the XML during layout. Because of this, remove entirely the tables of contents and lists of figures and tables from the Word documents.