Hyphenation and word division/Worttrennung

Germans learn word division at school, because they have to do it in handwriting (some German words won't even fit on one line). English speakers encounter it first in MS Word.

Most of my German clients deliver electronic files, and they seem to like both the left and right margins to be justified (Blocksatz). I don't understand that, but I suppose we don't all have to be the same.

Turn off automatic word division if you go into English. It isn't as necessary as in German.

But what do you do when you have to revise word divisions in proofs for a booklet that has to be published? Here are a few I did yesterday. The asterisks mark the division given in the layout, the second versions with hyphens my corrections:

recogniz*ed: Trennung, wenn überhaupt, recog-nized move*ment: nicht trennen, da am Ende einer Seite cour*tyard: Trennung kann nur court-yard sein Carolingi*an: Trennung, wenn überhaupt, Carolin-gian lar*ger: nicht trennen architectu*re: Trennung architec-ture symboliz*ed: Trennung symbol-ized hig*hest: Trennung high-est cha*racteristic: Trennung char-acteristic massi*ve: nicht trennen, ob am Ende einer Seite oder überhaupt qua*drangle: Trennung quad-rangle baro*que: Trennung bar-oque

Most of these are obvious, and perhaps I should just leave non-obvious ones alone, but I am attracted by the Oxford Mini-Dictionary of Spelling. I know I bought another one once and found it had all the U.S. divisions (they go by syllables rather than by derivation). U.S. divisions can be found in Merriam-Webster's.

But this Hyphenologist site gives good rules at the end, and it shows how all the books disagree with each other and within publishers. It's the kind of site that makes you think the best thing to do is to go back to bed.

(Tanks to Philip on the ITI GerNet mailing list)