11 Facts About Desktop publishing

Desktop publishing is the creation of documents using page layout software on a personal computer.

Desktop publishing often requires the use of a personal computer and WYSIWYG page layout software to create documents for either large-scale publishing or small-scale local multifunction peripheral output and distribution – although a non-WYSIWYG system such as LaTeX could be used for the creation of highly structured and technically demanding documents as well.

Desktop publishing methods provide more control over design, layout, and typography than word processing.

The desktop publishing market took off in 1985 with the introduction in January of the Apple LaserWriter printer.

Indeed, one popular desktop publishing book was titled The Mac is Not a Typewriter, and it had to actually explain how a Mac could do so much more than a typewriter.

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Desktop publishing was still in its embryonic stage in the early 1980s.

Desktop publishing moved into the home market in 1986 with Professional Page for the Amiga, Publishing Partner for the Atari ST, GST's Timeworks Publisher on the PC and Atari ST, and Calamus for the Atari TT030.

Desktop publishing skills were considered of primary importance in career advancement in the 1980s, but increased accessibility to more user-friendly DTP software has made DTP a secondary skill to art direction, graphic design, multimedia development, marketing communications, and administrative careers.

Some desktop publishing programs allow custom sizes designated for large format printing used in posters, billboards and trade show displays.

Furthermore, with the advent of TeX editors the line between desktop publishing and markup-based typesetting is becoming increasingly narrow as well; a software which separates itself from the TeX world and develops itself in the direction of WYSIWYG markup-based typesetting is GNU TeXmacs.

Desktop publishing produces primarily static print or digital media, the focus of this article.