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Here on Japanese.SE, sometimes we see furigana like 司る【つかさどる】, where the
characters beneath the furigana get pushed apart because the furigana doesn't
quite fit. Sometimes when I'm writing answers I find myself avoiding furigana
because I think it makes it harder to read having things pushed so far apart.

But I've noticed that even in professional published writing, sometimes
furigana seem to push characters apart. For example, I took this picture of a
page from
[連環宇宙](http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E9%80%A3%E7%92%B0%E5%AE%87%E5%AE%99-%E5%89%B5%E5%85%83%EF%BC%B3%EF%BC%A6%E6%96%87%E5%BA%AB-%E3%83%AD%E3%83%90%E3%83%BC%E3%83%88%E3%83%BB%E3%83%81%E3%83%A3%E3%83%BC%E3%83%AB%E3%82%BA%E3%83%BB%E3%82%A6%E3%82%A3%E3%83%AB%E3%82%B9%E3%83%B3/dp/4488706061)
(the Japanese translation of _Vortex_ ):

![furigana pushing kanji apart](https://i.stack.imgur.com/UBilY.jpg)

On this page, 流暢【りゅうちょう】 and 上唇【うわくちびる】 each take up three squares instead of
two because of how tall the furigana are.

I decided to search online to see what native speakers thought about this sort
of thing, but I couldn't figure out what it might be called!

Is there a special term for this sort of thing?
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2015-05-08T06:20:38.507
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2015-05-08T16:33:21.667
question
furigana
What's it called when furigana push characters apart because they're so long?
There are several methods of adjustment when the ruby is longer than the
parent text. Adobe InDesign has a set of options named
[ルビが親文字より長い時の調整](http://www.incunabula.co.jp/dtp-s/InDesign_DTP/InDesign_danraku/InDesign%20CS2_20.html).
I don't know the specific term for such adjustments in general.

One strategy is to allow the ruby to overlap the main text surrounding the
parent text, which is called 文字かけ(処理).

The style of ruby in this picture is achieved by InDesign's 文字かけ処理:なし and
親文字間の調整:両端揃え options (see ④ below). 文字かけなし means the ruby can never overlap
the main text surrounding the parent text. 両端揃え means there is no space
_before_ and _after_ the parent text, but the spaces _between_ the characters
of the parent text can be large.

One well-known method of inserting spaces in the main text is called
[1-2-1ルール](http://www.japanlink.co.jp/dtpjiten/ru/rubyjisrule.html).

**EDIT:** Here are the examples of various ruby settings (created using
InDesign CC 2014)

  * ① 文字かけ：無制限 (Gets less readable when the ruby is really long)
  * ② 文字かけ：なし、親文字間の調整：1-2-1ルール
  * ③ 文字かけ：ルビ1文字分、親文字間の調整：1-2-1ルール (This is my favorite)
  * ④ 文字かけ：なし、親文字間の調整：両端揃え (This is worst IMO)

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/QXTYt.jpg)
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2015-05-08T07:41:19.103
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2015-05-08T16:33:21.667
2015-05-08T16:33:21.667
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