useful information

Glossary - W

WAN

Communications network covering a wide geographic area such as a state or a country.

Wash drawing

Drawing containing washes of tone in addition to areas of solid colour.

Washing-up

Cleaning of ink from the printing press.

Waterless printing

A printing process that runs on offset lithography presses, but without using water. The non-image areas of the plate are coated with silicone, allowing the ink to run off freely into shallow wells, in the plate. Because finer dots can be used in waterless printing, the image is very detailed. The cost for this printing process is high, but the results can be magnificent.

Watermark

A symbol or trademark manufactured into the wet, raw paper pulp with a dandy roll, visible when paper is held to light - or a background text or graphic element that appears very lightly on each page, behind the primary text or graphic elements, created at around 10% - 20%. Watermarks differ from headers and footers in that they are very light and can be placed anywhere on the page.

Weatherability

Capability of a label to withstand the effects of outdoor conditions such as sunlight, heat, cold, humidity, rain, snow, and time.

Web

A continuous roll of printing paper used on web-fed presses.

Web break

A tear through a roll of paper, either while it is being manufactured at the mill, or while it is running through a printing press. When the web breaks, either at the mill or on press, machinery must be shut down, causing a loss of production time.

Web direction

See machine direction.

Web page

Text and graphics sent to a web browser by a web server, which may or may not fill more than one computer screen, but all of which can be viewed by scrolling.

Web Paper

Paper that comes in a roll rather than in sheets. A web press runs this paper, folding and/or cutting it after it is printed.

Web perfector

A web-printing machine that prints on both sides of the web at once.

Web press

A press specifically designed to print rolls of paper called webs, rather than sheets. A web press runs much faster than a sheet-fed press: as many as 40,000 images per hour versus a maxi- mum of about 14,000 per hour on a sheet-fed press.

Web server

Server supporting one or more websites, and which supplies web pages to web browsers on request.

Web site

One or more interlinked web pages controlled by a single organisation and linked to a single homepage.

Web tension

The amount of pull or tension applied in the direction of travel of a web of paper through a web press.

Web-offset

Offset press working from a web or reel of paper.

Wedge serif

A serif with a straight slope as opposed to the curve of the bracketed serif.

Weight (1)

Degree of boldness of a typeface. Futura type, for example, is made in light, medium, book, heavy, bold and extra bold - the different weights.

Weight (2)

The tonnage or poundage of a quantity of paper. The weight of paper may be expressed as basis weight, ream weight, M weight, or grammage. Basis weight is the weight in pounds of 500 sheets of paper cut to a given standard size (called basic size), such as 25"x38", depending on the grade of paper. Ream weight is the actual weight in pounds of 500 sheets of paper, regardless of basic size of grade. M weight is the actual weight of 1,000 sheets of paper. Because this is twice the quantity of a ream of paper, it is also twice the ream weight. Grammage is a metric measure similar to the basis weight of paper. Unlike basis weight, which uses different basic sizes for different grades of paper, grammage always uses the same sheet size - one square meter - regardless of the paper grade.

Wet End

The front end of the papermaking machine, including the head- box, wire, and presses. Paper is more water than fiber in this section of the machine.

Wet Trap Printing

A layer of wet ink over, or adjacent to, a previous layer of wet ink.

Wet-on-wet

Colour printing when the first colour of ink is still wet when the subsequent colours are printed.

Wf

An abbreviation for 'wrong fount'. Used when correcting proofs to indicate where a character is in the wrong typeface.

White point

This is a term used to describe the characteristics of a monitor. The value is given as a colour temperature (in Kelvin), which represents the monitor's ability to display a pure white. Also the point set in scanning for the lightest high light dot that does not burn out - usually around 3C, 2M, 2Y, 0K.

White space

The area of a page with no printing on it.

Whiteness

The measure of the amount of light reflected from a sheet of paper. How white a paper is depends on how evenly it reflects all colours in the visible spectrum. If it reflects more blue than red and yellow, it will have a cool, blue tinge to it, making it appear brighter than white. A cool paper will appear brighter than a similar paper with a warm tinge. A cool or warm tinge doesn't affect paper quality, but it does create optical impressions. For example, in colour printing with blues and blacks predominating, a cool white sheet tends to brighten the colours. But colour printing with reds, oranges, and yellows predominating, a neutral or warm white sheet tends to make the colours appear clearer and stronger.

Widow

A single word left on the last line of a paragraph that falls at the top of a page.

Windows

A software technique that allows a rectangular area of a computer screen to display output from a program. With a number of programs running at one time, several windows can appear on the screen at one time. Information can be cut and pasted from one window to another. The best-known version of "windows" is that developed by Microsoft.

Windows colour palette

Not all 256 colours available on an Apple Macintosh are available when Web sites are viewed in a browser - Windows operating system reserves several colours for its own use. By only using colours available on the 216 ‘Windows Safe’ palettes the site’s colours will work and look good - regardless of platform.

Wire

The wire mesh used at the wet end of the paper making process. The wire determines the textures of the paper.

Wire Side

The bottom side of the paper that comes in contact with the wire (now called the forming fabric) of the paper machine during the papermaking process. The topside of the paper is called the felt side. As the water drains through the wire during manufacture, it carries fibers, fillers, and other chemicals with it, depositing more of them on the wire side than on the felt side of the paper. This can result in the wire and felt sides having slightly different textures.

Wire stitching

See saddle or side stitching.

Without colour

See Achromatic.

With-the-grain

Direction of the stock's fibers.

Wood free paper

Made from chemical pulp only with size added. Supplied calendered or super-calendered.

Woodcut

A block of wood with a design carved into it and non-printing areas cut away. The woodcut is inked and pressed against stock to make an image.

Word break

The division of a word at the end of a line.

Word wrap

In word processing, the automatic adjustment of the number of words on a line of text to match the margin settings. The carriage returns set up by this method are termed "soft", as against "hard" carriage returns resulting from the return key.

Work and Back

See imposition.

Work-and-tumble

Printing procedure in which both front and back images are imposed on one plate or set of plates if more than one colour is being used. The sheet is printed on the topside, turned head over heels, and the back side is printed. Two different gripper edges are used.

Work-and-turn

Printing procedure in which both front and back images are imposed on one plate or set of plates if more than one colour is being used. One side is then printed and the sheet is then turned over and printed from the other edge using the same forme. One gripper edge is used. The finished sheet is then cut to produce two complete copies.

World Wide Web

Often abbreviated to 'Web' or W3, the World Wide Web is a system of protocols that allows hypermedia data to be exchanged across a network, usually the Internet. This system comprises the use of HTML code to provide an easy way to publish and access information on-line. Tim Berners-Lee, a computer specialist, along with his partner Robert Cailliau, did not invent it in America but in Geneva at the European Laboratory for Particle Physics, CERN. The web is not synonymous with the Internet - it is an application of the Internet.

Wove Finish

Uncoated paper that has an even finish with slight toothiness.

Wove paper

Is made on a roll of closely woven, finely textured wire, which leaves no marks on the paper surface.

Wrap-around label

Label that extends completely around the labeled surface.

Wrong reading

Reverse of the original image or type.

WWW

World Wide Web; a set of Internet servers that provide hypertext services to clients running WWW browsers.

WYSIWYG

Pronounced "wizzywig" - what-you-see-is-what-you-get, describes systems that preview full pages on the screen with text and graphics. It can be misleading due to difference in resolutions of computer screens. It also refers to WYSIWYG Editors, HTML generating programmes that allow an HTML page to be designed in the mode of a page layout programme rather than in code.