All, I am aware of \showlayout and Patrick's \ShowLayout. In the case of the former, I have this in my environment file: \showlayout \definelayout[myCustomLayout][ header=30mm, footer=20mm, headerdistance=10mm, footerdistance=10mm, topspace=30mm, bottomspace=25mm, height=middle, leftmargin=25mm, rightmargin=30mm, leftmargindistance=10mm, rightmargindistance=10mm, backspace=50mm, width=middle, ] \setuplayout[myCustomLayout] But when I compile, the first page reveals these measurements: header=1.99962 cm %way off footer 1.99962 cm %acceptable headerdistance=0.0 cm %huh? footer distance=0.0 cm %huh? And the list goes on. These don't seem correct at all. Am I misusing this tool? I've been following the discussion on the beginner's manual with interest, biding my time to make my suggestions, thinking about it. One thing that really comes to mind is the huge amount of time I spent as a beginner trying to figure out what settings in the layout, like those above, actually do. And I found the tools for analyzing changes to these layout settings did not help very much. Something that could help the beginniner's manual very much would be a macro that layed the page out accurately with borders around the various areas (as in \showframe) that include all parts of the layout, even if they wander from the printed page. This would accelerate the learning curve for layout dramatically, if it were available. David