The Forestry Publications group works in both Word and WordPerfect.
Files in either of those formats are readily usable. If you work in other
software, especially for tables and figures, consult Sue Nall, who does
text processing in Forestry Publications, about how to make sure your files
are usable.
If you are planning to submit a manuscript for in-house publication, don't do coding or styling to make the text look a particular way. All that work must be stripped out before layout and publication, meaning a lot of time on both our parts is lost. Since uncoded and unformatted files usually run faster, we'll save time two ways (by not spending the time coding or uncoding, and by not working slowly through bogged-down files).
Numbering figures and tables: Sequentially number figures and tables separately for the whole manuscript.
Organization: Discuss data and subcategories in the same order consistently, in text, tables, and figures.
Placing figures and tables: Don't embed figures and tables. Embedding makes the files enormous, slows processing, and must be reversed before layout can be done. Within manuscript drafts, put each figure and each table on a separate page; list all figure captions on one page.
Page numbering: Make sure pages are numbered, whether
electronically or by hand. Putting a date on the manuscript can be useful
for tracking changes between drafts.
