Editing Copy editing (section)

=== Mechanical editing ===
Mechanical editing is the process of closely reading a piece of writing for consistency, either internally or in accordance with the publisher's house style. According to Einsohn, mechanical editors work with such things as the following:<ref>{{cite book |last=Einsohn |first=Amy |title=The Copyeditor's Handbook: A Guide for Book Publishing and Corporate Communications, with Exercises and Answer Keys |year=2011 |publisher=University of California |location=Berkeley, California |isbn=978-0-520-27156-2 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hbMwDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA5 | quote= The heart of copyediting consists of making a manuscript conform to an ''editorial style'' (also called ''house style''). Editorial style includes: <br/> spelling <br/> hyphenation <br/> capitalization <br/> punctuation <br/> treatment of numbers and numerals <br/>treatment of quotations <br/> use of abbreviations and acronyms <br/> use of italics and bold type <br/> treatment of special elements (headings, lists, tables, charts, and graphs) <br/> format of footnotes or endnotes and other documentation. }}</ref>
* Abbreviations and acronyms
* Additional elements, such as charts, tables, and graphs
* Capitalization
* [[note (typography)|Footnotes and endnotes]]
* [[Syllabification|Hyphenation]]
* Italicization (appropriate use of [[emphasis (typography)|emphasis]] (italic or bold); appropriate choice of broad typeface category ([[italic type|italic]], [[roman type|roman]], other), especially in mathematical or scientific texts)
* Numbers and numerals
* Punctuation
* Quotations
* Spelling

Gilad also mentions the following:<ref>{{cite book |last=Gilad |first=Suzanne |title=Copyediting & Proofreading for Dummies |year=2007 |page=50 |publisher=Wiley |location=Hoboken, New Jersey |isbn=978-0-470-12171-9}}</ref>{{Request quotation|date=April 2016}}
* Initialisms
* Page numbers, headers, and footers
* Underscoring

Proper spelling and punctuation are subjective in some cases, where they must be left to the discretion of the copy editor or the publisher. Most publishing firms use a widely recognized [[style guide]] such as the ''[[New Oxford Style Manual]]'', ''[[The Chicago Manual of Style]]'' and ''[[List of style guides#Canada|The Canadian Style]]''. Companies that produce documents and reports but do not consider themselves publishers in the usual sense tend to rely on in-house style guides or on the judgment of the copy editor.<ref name="einsohn2011" />{{rp|5}}