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Lorem Ipsum

Margaret Rouse
Technology Expert

Last updated: 12 January, 2024

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What Does Lorem Ipsum Mean?
Lorem ipsum, in graphical and textual context, refers to filler text that is placed in
a document or visual presentation. Lorem ipsum is derived from the Latin
“dolorem ipsum” roughly translated as “pain itself.”

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Lorem ipsum presents the sample font and orientation of writing on web pages
and other software applications where content is not the main concern of the
developer.

Techopedia Explains Lorem Ipsum

Lorem ipsum is the filler text that typically demonstrates the font and style of a
text in a document or visual demonstration. It serves as a place holder indicating
where the text will be in the final iteration.

Originally from Latin, Lorem ipsum has no intelligible meaning. It is simply a

display of letters to be viewed as a sample with given graphical elements in a file.

“Lipsum” (a portmanteau of lorem and ipsum) generators are commonly used to

form generic text in a file. The words are adequately like normal text to
demonstrate a font, without distracting the reader with its content.

It has been used by printers as placeholder text since the 16th century.

Richard McClintock discovered the origins of the words Lorem Ipsum back in
1982, who published his findings in 1994 in a letter to the editor of Before &
After magazine who wrongly claimed that the passage had no meaning.

In fact, it originates from a treatise on the theory of ethics written by Cicero in 45

BC: “de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum” (The Extremes of Good and Evil).

The passage that is usually used is the one below:

“Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor
incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.”
 However, although it looks like Latin, the original words from Cicero have been
scrambled and interjected with meaningless filler text for reasons that defy
history.

According to McClintock, but it’s just a theory, a part of the original text was
scrambled by 15th century typesetter who needed placeholder text to mockup
various fonts for a type specimen book.

No matter what the true history may be, today Lorem ipsum is widely used since
it closely resembles English more than Latin, creating a natural looking block of
text that doesn’t distract the reader from the layout.

The passage became popularized in the 1960s when Letraset used it to advertise
their dry-transfer sheets. It reached the digital world between the 1980s and
1990s when Aldus bundled the text in the word-processing templates of their
desktop publishing software PageMaker.

Later on, it was widely adopted by other word processors, such as Microsoft
Word; and by content management system tools, such as WordPress for stock
websites, page templates, and themes.

Today, a large number of variations of Lorem ipsum actually exist.

On the Internet, there are many generators that repeat predefined chunks and
combine them with model sentences to create believable structures.

Some of them inject the random text with random Latin words, humor or even
profanities.

In fact, it can be argued that Lorem Ipsum generators are the first true generator
that ever hit the Internet.

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TAGS
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 TECH 101
 

Margaret Rouse

Margaret Rouse is an award-winning technical writer and teacher known for her
ability to explain complex technical subjects to a non-technical, business
audience. Over the past twenty years her explanations have appeared on
TechTarget websites and she's been cited as an authority in articles by the New
York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine and Discovery
Magazine.Margaret's idea of a fun day is helping IT and business professionals
learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages. If you have a suggestion
for a new definition or how to improve a technical explanation, please email
Margaret or contact her…
All Posts by Margaret Rouse
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