Mudcat HTML Guide PermaThread

Subject: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 May 00 - 07:49 PM

Line Breaks

There is only one HTML tag you need to know to post messages at the Mudcat Cafe - it's the <br> line break. Put one at the end of every line of songs you post, and at the end of paragraphs. If you want to double-space between paragraphs, make sure you put a line break in the blank line. Once again, line breaks look like this:

<br>

NOTE: Mudcat now has automatic linebreaks and a link-making tool - but it's still helpful to know these things.
-Joe Offer, August, 2003-

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One other note: Try to make avoid using the HTML Paragraph <p> tag at Mudcat, especially when you are posting lyrics. Instead, put a <br> line break in every line, even the empty lines that form the spaces between stanzas. the paragraph tag will make lyrics look right in most browsers, but the blank spaces between stanzas get lost if you copy-and-paste lyrics into a word processor.

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Clickable Links (Blue Clicky Things)

If you want to direct somebody to an interesting site on the Web (or to information that's at another location at the Mudcat Cafe), the best way to do it is by posting a clickable link. Here's how:

<a href="https://www.mudcat.org/">Click here</a>

<a href="mailto:[e-mail]/">Click to e-mail</a>

I find it's best to open a new browser window [CTRL-N] and navigate your way to the site you want to link to. Highlight and copy [CTRL-C] the URL (address) of the site, and then go back to your Mudcat message and paste [CTRL-V] the URL into your link. Be sure to include the http:// in that URL. The quotation marks are standard procedure, but most links and HTML tags work just fine without quotation marks.

-Joe Offer-

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Dan Mulligan's Famous HTML Guide

Now, take a look at an HTML Guide submitted by Mudcatter Dan Mulligan and find out about some of the fun stuff.
-Joe Offer-

From Dan Mulligan, April 6, 1998 (edited by Joe Offer):

There seem to be a lot of HTML questions being asked these days, so I thought I would try to help out.
Here is a list of html tags. The word in the center is an example of what the tag does.
Each tag begins with < (left angle bracket) and ends with > (right angle bracket).
Style Tags modify the way your text looks. NOTE: In general, all HTML commands will take the form:
<COMMAND> text </COMMAND>.

• <B>bold</B>
• <I>italics</I>
• <STRONG>strong</STRONG>
• <BLINK>blink</BLINK>
• <CODE>code</CODE>
• <EM>emphasize</EM>
• <ADDRESS>
  address
  </ADDRESS>
• <CITE>citation</CITE>
• <SAMP>sample</SAMP>
• <KBD>keyboard entry</KBD>
• <TT>teletype</TT>
• <BIG>big print</BIG>
• <SMALL>small print</SMALL>
• <SUB>_subscript</SUB>
• <SUP>^superscript</SUP>
• <STRIKE>strikeout</STRIKE>
• <PRE>

  preformatted text

  </PRE>

Heading Tags are very similar to style tags. Headings come in six sizes, 1-6. 1 is the largest. 6 is smallest. The heading tag also includes an implicit <BR> at the beginning and end. The format for the heading tags is <H#> with # being a number 1-6, and they look like this:

<H1>

This is a size 1 heading

</H1>

<H2>

This is a size 2 heading

</H2>

<H5>

This is a size 5 heading

LINKS

Links come in three basic varieties: links to other files, links to the same file and links to pictures.
To link to another file on another server, use
<A HREF="http://server/path/filename.html"> anchor text </A>. This is called absolute linking. The tag is called an anchor.

Example: <A HREF="http://www.disney.com"> The Walt Disney Home Page </A>

To link to another file on the same server, use <A HREF="path/filename.html"> anchor text </A>. That is called relative linking.

Example: <A HREF="../auction/Auction.html"> The Auction Block</A>

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Click here for more HTML stuff

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Note: I copied most of this from a message Dan Mulligan posted in another thread. It's a great piece of work, and deserves its own thread.
Thanks, Dan. Because of the value of this information as a permanent reference, I will maintain this thread. Feel free to post messages to this thread, but note that we reserve the right to keep this thread as a reference by editing or deleting messages.
Thanks, Dan.
-Joe Offer

Subject: Posting Chords
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 May 00 - 07:50 PM

The best way to post chords here is the use the preformat tag <pre> before and </pre> after the section with the chords, making sure to use automatic linebreaks or put <br> line breaks after every line (but not both).

The preformat tag sets a monospaced font, so every letter takes up the same amount of space on the screen (normal fonts take less space for the letter i than they do for m, so it's hard to keep things aligned from one line to the line below it. The best way to prepare chords for posting is to type them up as a text file and get them to look just the way you want them to look, and then add the line breaks and preformat tags, and then paste the whole thing into a Mudcat message box. Oh - be sure to use spaces to separate chords, because tabs don't aren't always consistent.

-Joe Offer-

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Here's a great idea from Walter Corey:

This is a format I've been using to type up songs. Bold letters indicate where the chord changes. You could use underlines also. Here is an example:

NOBODY KNOWS YOU WHEN YOU'RE DOWN AND OUT - (Jimmy Cox)

Once I lived the life of a millionaire (C-E7-A7)
Spending my money, with never a care (Dm-A7-Dm-A7-Dm)
Takin' all my friends out for a mighty good time (F-B7-C-A7)
Drinkin' high-priced liquor, champagne and wine; (D7-G7)

This involves more HTML coding to set off the bold, but it's not too much more complicated than putting the line breaks in. I don't know whether people would find this less intrusive than embedding the chords right in the line.

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When I'm using a lot of start/stop tags like Walter does in this situation, I type them out once and copy-paste them where I need them, filling in between them when I need to.
So, I'd type <b></b> only once, highlight and copy [CTRL-C] it, and then paste [CTRL-V] it wherever I need it.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: Copy-and-Paste & Line Breaks
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 May 00 - 07:58 PM

Posting Lyrics with Line Breaks

Here's how to put line breaks in lyrics you type up in Microsoft Word. The process should be much the same in other word processors.

• Type the lyrics up and edit and spell-check and save them.
  
• Then, go to the "edit" menu at the top of your page, and choose "replace."
  
• Under "replace" you'll find a "special" designation for special characters. Choose "paragraph mark" and put that in the "find" box.
  
• Then, in the "replace with" box, put "paragraph mark" and <br> (a line break tag)
  
• Then choose "replace all."

This varies from one version of Word to another, but it's more-or-less the same in the various versions.

You want to replace the paragraph mark with another one PLUS the line break. Otherwise, you lose all your paragraph marks and what you see on your screen is hard to read, and hard to work with.

Remember, when you are posting lyrics, you want to have <br> line breaks in each and every line, including the blank lines between stanzas and in the paragraphs for any comments you might want to make along with the lyrics. Please do NOT use <p> paragraph marks, because paragraph marks often don't work correctly when you copy-and-paste lyrics from the Forum into a word processor.

When all the line breaks are just how you want them, highlight the whole thing in your word processor and copy it ( [CTRL-C] is the keyboard shortcut for copying) then paste [CTRL-V] it into the message box at Mudcat, and then hit the grey "submit message" button.

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Keyboard Shortcuts

Assuming you are using Windows 95 or 98 and Netscape or Microsoft Internet Explorer, here's what you do:

• highlight the section you want to copy - put your mouse cursor at the beginning of the section, and click and hold the left mouse button. Then, holding the button, move the cursor to the end of the section, and release your mouse button. All the text you've selected should have changed color, usually to blue.
• Next, copy the test - move your mouse cursor so it's ove the highlighted area, and click and hold your right mouse button. A menu will pop up, and you should select "copy" from the menu. The menu will disappear, and the information will be copied into your computer's memory (clipboard), and stay there until you copy something else.
• Finally, paste the information wherever you want to put it - into a Mudcat message box, a word processing document, or an e-mail message you're writing. To paste, move your mouse cursor to the place where you want to put the information. then, click on your right mouse button again and select "paste" from the menu. That should do the trick for you.

I often like to use keyboard shortcuts instead of using my mouse to find things from menus. Here are some handy shortcuts:

• CTRL-C - Copy
• CTRL-V - Paste
• CTRL-X - Cut
• CTRL-S - Save
• CTRL-N - Open New Browser Window
• CTRL-Z - Undo whatever you did last

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By the way, note that this thread is primarily to be used as a reference and a place for people to post HTML questions and get answers. There are always several HTML Practice threads going, or feel free to start a new practice thread if you'd like to experiment. Practice all you want in the practice threads. We go through them occasionally and delete old messages.
Thanks.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: Links to Online HTML Guides
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 May 00 - 08:00 PM

• HTML Goodies (from Tony Burns)
• Big Nose Bird's HTML Tricks (from katlaughing)
• Webmonkey HTML Cheatsheet (from katlaughing)
• Mudcatter George Seto's HTML Guide (from Dale Rose)
• Enhancing Your Chats (?) (from Dale Rose)
• Introduction to HTML (from AndyG)
• Sucky to Savvy - HTML Tricks (from AndyG)
• Javaboutique (from Mary in Kentucky)
• SELFHTML (in German)(from MudGuard)
• Fonts (from Bill D)
• More to come. Watch this space.... If you have other favorite HTML guides, post them below and I'll incorporate them into this list.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Dale Rose
Date: 25 May 00 - 11:11 PM

Then there's the guide set up by our own George Seto. HTML Coding This is where I learned practically everything I know about HTML soon after getting on the internet about four years ago. (refined somewhat by a few tricks I learned from Joe after I got here)

Especially helpful is his page Enhancements for Web-Chatting My own take on that

I could not find a link back to his main page though, so here it is. Look there for all sorts of information about Gaelic, Cape Breton Music and other things of interest. His lyrics are filed under Cape Breton Music.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Mark Clark
Date: 01 Jun 00 - 04:23 PM

Joe, great job on this thread. I hadn't looked in on it for a while. Of course no list of HTML references can be complete without a link to NCSA's Beginner's Guide to HTML. The cross linking on this site makes it a great reference and there is a downloadable version as well.

      - Mark

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: MudGuard
Date: 02 Jun 00 - 03:27 AM

For all who really want to know about HTML, here is the standard: http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/.
And the standard for cascading style sheets CSS: http://www.w3.org/TR/PR-CSS2/.

Then there is a nice list which shows which html targets are supported by which version of Netscape and Internet Explorer (up to NS4.7 and IE5.0) and in which version of the standard they are defined: http://www.ncdesign.org/html/list.htm

And some tips how not to do it: HTML Hell

MudGuard

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: John in Brisbane
Date: 03 Jun 00 - 02:07 AM

I find that AOLPress goves me the best of both worlds. For run of the mill layout stuff you simply type the text into a word processor format - WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get). You can toggle to the HTML code to see what's really happening and there are excellent tutorials to help you along the way for the more complex stuff, like tables or linking images. When you're in HTML mode you can copy the code direct to the Mudcat Forum or save the .htm file for later use.

IT'S FREE! I downloaded mine from ZD-Net, but any decent search engine should find it. A professional Web developer recommended it to me on the first instance.

Regards, John

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Frank McGrath
Date: 03 Jun 00 - 06:17 PM

Here is an excellent resource for those wishing to learn HTML.
HTML Trainingtools
It is comprehensive and covers everything you need to know and a lot more besides.

Frank

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: GUEST,Accentless Mrr
Date: 14 Jun 00 - 03:23 PM

Hi, can anyone find anything in either HTML or Word that will allow for a LONG umlaut, not 2 dots but more like quotation marks that go over a letter, or 2 acute accents together on one letter? I have sought in vain so far and asked on a few random threads... but perhaps y'all might know... Also, is there any way to do a single accent that is perfectly vertical, e.g. neither acute nor grave?
The reason I ask is that Hungarian has both those diacritical marks (the neither-acute-nor-grave accent and the long umlaut or double accent) and nobody in my family so far has been able to figure out how to make them using regular software like Word or html.

Thanks, all!

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: MudGuard
Date: 14 Jun 00 - 03:38 PM

Sirry, the accents you want are not possible with html entities. In Word you would need a font that has these characters - I do not know of any font that has these.
MudGuard

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 15 Jun 00 - 10:01 AM

That's what I was afraid of. Boogers. Thanks, though, saved me more searching and frustration...(Assuming that Sirry is me)

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Roger in Sheffield
Date: 15 Jun 00 - 03:37 PM

Thanks
I have printed it off and will try to make sense of it

Roger

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: MMario
Date: 15 Jun 00 - 04:09 PM

a hungarian font can be downloaded from here

url=http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~arubin/hungarian.html

and this page has some utilities that may help http://www.dtcc.edu/~berlin/font/utils.htm

click

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Pene Azul
Date: 15 Jun 00 - 04:16 PM

There is a Truetype Hungarian font here (click) from this page (click). That'll work for your word processing anyway.

PA

Subject: Doing HTML Offline
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Sep 00 - 03:06 PM

Here's a tip fromMudGuard. If you have unlimited Internet service (or don't mind paying for the time), feel free to practice HTML in one of our practice threads, or start a new practice thread. We occasionally clean out the practice threads by deleting messages, so you don't need to worry about overburdening the Mudcat. Just remember that we don't allow embedded objects (like images and sounds).
-Joe Offer-

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Just a suggestion to reduce these HTML test postings.

In your favourite text editor, create a new file and save it. The name of the file does not matter, but the extension should be .htm or .html
Now type whatever you want to test (what you would have posted here) in that file.
Now open this file in your browser (type the path to it in your browser's address bar). You should see the contents as a web page.

If you now save this address in your bookmarks/favourites, you can easily test whatever you write in your file.

Besides reducing the number of postings here, you can do this offline so you can save money doing this

This is just a suggestion, if you have problems with HTML I am always willing to help! But I think many of these postings don't need to be here...

MudGuard

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Robby
Date: 26 Sep 00 - 01:52 PM

Well, it has only taken me about three days and a couple of message attempts before seeing that / (slash) after the < (left angle bracket) before the COMMAND and > (right angle bracket) at the the conclusions of the text and realizing that without that /, the COMMAND goes on for the rest of the message. I just gotta get me some new specs.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: MudGuard
Date: 27 Sep 00 - 07:20 AM

Robby, here are the newest specs for HTML ;-)
MudGuard

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Oct 00 - 12:08 AM

I know there is an easy way to do this, but heck if I can find it in any of the guides I have bookmarked, nor in here, BUT my eyes are bleary from looking, so please forgive me if this is a redundant question:

How do I code for bullets in front of each item on a list? Do I use the ordered list tag or what?

Thanks!

Subject: HTML: Bulleted Lists
From: Joe Offer
Date: 19 Oct 00 - 12:49 AM

Hi, Kat - I use

• the command <ul> to begin the list
• <li> at the beginning of every line
  • (including the first in the list)
• and </ul> at the end.
  • Note that I used <ul> and <li> and </ul> in the middle of the list to set off subcategories.
  -Joe-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Oct 00 - 12:58 AM

Huh, Joe, I did that, on a site I am working on at Tripod, used the UL and IL, just as I'd seen it done elsewhere and I got indent but no bullets,as you can see here: natrona county grassroots project. I will check it, again, though to make sure I typed everything in correctly. It's a really simple thing, so far, but I am slowly getting to it.

Thanks a bunch,

kat

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Oct 00 - 01:08 AM

Nope, I just checked it and I didn't do it that way. Too tired tonight, but I will change it tomorrow. Thanks, Joe.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: MudGuard
Date: 19 Oct 00 - 04:30 AM

kat, is that just a typo that you used UL and IL? Of course it should be UL and LI.
Joe, to do it conforming to standard the </li> at the end of each list item (which can be longer than one line, btw) is optional but should be used if CSS is used to format li items
MudGuard

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: wysiwyg
Date: 19 Oct 00 - 07:37 AM

Commercial or endorsement:

I saved this thread as a file right out of my browser, onto my desktop. Now I can make clickies or cause other trouble anytime without hunting through e-mail templates like I used to.

~Susan

correction made, subsequent post deleted
- el joeclone -

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Oct 00 - 09:54 AM

Thanks, Mudgaurd, yes, I think it was a typo, I'll have to go check the website. It was late last night.*smile*

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Marion
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 05:17 PM

Two questions:

1. Is there a way to make a link to a particular post in another thread, rather than to the beginning of the thread?

2. Would it be OK to put a link (either here or in the FAQ thread) to an HTML practice thread? I think that would be easier than finding an existing thread every time I want to do a test, and less annoying than the proliferation of new test threads.

Marion

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: GUEST,Mary in Kentucky
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 05:26 PM

Marion - question #1) Yes.

Go to the top of the thread where it lists the names of people who have posted. Click on the person's post you want to link to. The URL will have a number for that particular post. Highlight it and use it.

Example: Your post above was http://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=21858&messages=26#327216

I'll link to it by putting that in the brackets here.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: GUEST,Mary in Kentucky
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 05:29 PM

oops...didn't work on this computer...later.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 05:39 PM

hmmm...works on this computer (different than above). Could be it's just faster, or I waited an extra second...

Subject: Blue Clickys Within Mudcat
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Dec 00 - 04:00 PM

If you put blue click in the "filter" box and set the age to three years, you'll find all sorts of weird stuff. Well, I thought I'd add a little to the confusion. As you all have been well-taught by now, a blue clicky this is made this way [Joe, paste in boilerplate instructions here]:

<a href="https://www.mudcat.org">Click here</a>

<a href="mailto:[e-mail]">Click to e-mail</a>

If you're posting links at Mudcat, the quotation marks are optional. I prefer not to use them, because they complicate the task of making links. Simple is better, I think. Fewer misteaks.

OK, so now I want to add a little thing to complicate matters. As you know, we've had some problem accessing Mudcat at the regular www.mudcat.org address lately, and have had to get here by loki and ragtime and shorty and other addresses. Therefore, somebody might end up posting a link to ragtime.mudcat.org/threads.cfm or something like that - and then Ragtime might go away, or Max might rename her. So, I'd like to suggest that whey you post liks to locations that are within Mudcat, you leave off the http://www.mudcat.org part. As long as you'r linking from Mudcat to Mudcat, it works. So, if you're linking to the FAQ, your link would look like this:

<a href="/thread.cfm?threadid=19340">Click here</a>

Make sense?

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Snuffy
Date: 22 Dec 00 - 06:49 PM

Joe, I assume that's one Double Quote " ([SHIFT]+"2"), not two Single Quotes ''?

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Dec 00 - 07:02 PM

Yeah, Snuffy, double quotes - and the quotes are optional here at Mudcat. Hmmm. My keyboard has the quotes next to the "enter" key, and the @ sign above the "2."
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 22 Dec 00 - 07:29 PM

Yes Joe, Snuffy like myself will be using a UK keyboard - different to the US one. Double quote is shift 2 on ours and @ is above single quote next to the enter key.

Jon

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Snuffy
Date: 22 Dec 00 - 07:42 PM

Sorry, I only saw the " at the beginning, didn't notice there was one at the end too.

So as it's all internal on Mudcat, we can ignore both of them?

Wassail! V

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 23 Dec 00 - 03:16 AM

Just one small point with regards to Joe's excellent suggestion. Very occasionally, links to threads are given in the Help Forum. These still require the "http://www.mudcat.org" bit to work.

As for the quotes, I will leave that to someone more qualified in HTML to be the judge but my understanding is that dropping the quotes is non-standard HTML which could mean that some browser may not interpret the link correctly (not that I am aware of a browser that fails on this). If quotes are used, it has to be both: the most common cause of a locked up thread for Netscape users is a missing closing quote on a link.

Jon

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Dec 00 - 03:26 AM

MudGuard will slap my hand for saying this, but I've never seen a link where quotes are needed (although there are some rare situations) - and I've had to fix jillions of links where the closing quotes were left off and that locked the thread.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: CarolC
Date: 23 Dec 00 - 05:54 AM

Dangerous Goat Cheese

Dangerous Goat Cheese

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: CarolC
Date: 23 Dec 00 - 06:02 AM

I like it.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: MudGuard
Date: 23 Dec 00 - 12:58 PM

No, Joe, it's Christmas time, so I don't slap hands...
HTML standard says links do not need quotes unless they contain some special characters (like ampersand &, equal sign =, question mark ? ...).
On the other hand, most browsers do not need the quotes even if these characters are in the link.
MudGuard wishing a merry christmas

Subject: HTML Color Chart
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:46 AM

You'll find a really nice color chart here at HTML Goodies. I suppose it is "more correct" to use the hexadecimal number codes for numbers, but I find the words usually work and are far easier to use (hex numbers have always driven me batty). Note that specifications are often the same in various HTML tags - several can use COLOR=XXX or BGCOLOR=XXX, WIDTH=XXX% (you can use numbers, but percentages work slick with this), ALIGN=(right, left, center), SIZE=XXX. OK, so here's <hr size=25 color=pink width=60% align=right>:

---

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:55 AM

This color page is too cool. Scroll up and down fast, and watch how the colors change.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Roger in Sheffield
Date: 09 Jun 01 - 05:14 AM

refresh

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: GUEST,RichM
Date: 06 Jul 01 - 09:29 PM

To be or not to be....recognized as the member-in-good-standing that I really am!

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: GUEST,RichM
Date: 06 Jul 01 - 09:30 PM

Yes, No, Maybe this time?

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Jul 01 - 12:38 PM

GUEST, Accentless Mrr asked some time ago (14-Jun-00 - 03:23 PM) about how to produce a couple of Hungarian accented letters in HTML or in Word. So far as I can tell, HTML is limited to the special (&) characters defined in the standard, but in Word, there is a method that will work (sort of).

The marks requested were a "LONG umlaut, not 2 dots but more like quotation marks that go over a letter, or 2 acute accents together on one letter," and a "single accent that is perfectly vertical."

I'm sure that Guest is either long gone, or has become someone we know and love, but in case he/she is still around, or if some others might want this information:

In Word, use can use an "equation" field, with the "overstrike" option ( \o) to place two characters "in the same space." In older versions of Word, it was very difficult to find the Help file information for fields. The easiest method was to "insert" a field, type a known field type into it, and hit F1.

For help on fields in older versions of Word: Type "Ctrl-F9, eq, F1" which will take you directly to help for the equation field.

Unfortunately, this no longer works in newer versions of Word, but in newer versions you can open help, select the "index" tab, and type "eq" in the "Find" box, and it will now take you to what you need, at least for this one particular kind of field.

When you type a Ctrl-F9, Word inserts a blank field, which looks like a pair of Curly Braces "{}". When you insert a field, you will usually be switched to "View Fields" mode, but this can depend on how your preferences are set up. You can switch back and forth between "View Fields" where you see the "code" inside the field, and "View Result" where you see what the field does, using Shift-F9. Depending on your version of Word, this may turn on View Fields for the entire document or only for fields within an area you have highlighted. This can be a little disconcerting until you learn what to expect.

Using a plain "Double Quote" for the long umlaut, keystrokes would be:
Ctrl-F9 eq \o (A,")
The result will look like { eq \o (A,") }, and your cursor will be "inside the field, right after the ")".
If you hit F9 ("Update Field") you will (usually) be switched back to View Result and will see an A with a " typed on top of it. If it doesn't change automatically, just hit Shift-F9. The straight "Single Quote" can be used in the same way for the second mark requested.

The last step is to "unlink" the field. With your cursor still in the field, or with the area that contains the field highlighted ("selected" is the uSoft term) do a Ctrl-Shift-F9. This will leave you with the two characters printed on top of each other.

Especially in newer versions of Word, the Autocorrect function will probably be turned on to put "curly quotes" in when you type either a " or a '. You can turn this option off (and probably should when your writing HTML?), but there is also the option to hit a Ctrl-Z immediately after typing the ", which will "undo" the autocorrect and leave you with the straight ones.

For more convential marks, Word lets you hold down Ctrl while you type the "mark" and puts that mark over the next character you type. This only works with certain marks, but is good for the acute and grave accents. Unfortunately, there isn't a "magic code" built in for the special marks requested.

There are additional things you can do to move the marks around to get them where you want them, but anyone interested can see the details in the Word Help files. If you really want a special symbol to look good, you may have to play with a little bit once. Once you get ONE, you can just copy it where you want it.

I know this sounds terribly complex, but when you get the keystrokes down, it's really quite simple.

"Ctrl-F9 eq \o (U,") F9 Ctrl-Shift-F9" isn't really that tough, to get a very special character, especially once you understand what the keystrokes mean.

Unfortunately, none of this works in HTML, and if you put these kinds of things in your HTML to post, they will
probably be something else when they show up here. - :-(

John

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 02 Nov 01 - 12:58 PM


Bill D - and others who might be interested:

There has been much discussion about "characters" in what turned into an html practice thread at I can do ¿... recently.
Some of you might be interested in a couple of things I ran into while doing some "off-site" poking around, and here's a summary of some of the interesting stuff that's scattered around in that thread:

George Seto suggests http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~jwmitch/iso8859-1.html, for a nice clean chart of some of the html special characters. Nice clean site, and could be useful. One of the few places I've seen comment (brief) in differences between PC and Mac, but unfortuantely no discussion.

If you want the "real poop" you can consult the W3C Committee HTML 4.01 Specification . If you go down a couple of pages to the table of contents, you can click into the character definitions there. (This has been posted before, but it fits in with the topic here.)

If you want to see what a character looks like - especially ones that don't work, you can go to Unicode website, or you can go directly to the Online Unicode Handbook.

Bill D suggested a couple of pieces of pretty nice looking freeware called AllChars and Extended Character Map. While I have other utilities for what they do, they look like pretty clean stuff, and could be helpful to others.

I've posted the HTML 4 "defined characters" at HTML CHARACTERS REDACT, along with how they work on my setup. There have been some additions, particularly relating to what fonts people are likely to have.

An interesting site for those reallly interested in all this character coding stuff is at Alan Wood's Homesite. Some interesting comparisons of different "character definitions." I'd take a couple of technical issues with some of what's in his character comparisons, but the information seems basically sound.

Microsoft has a free plug-in that enhances the information you get when you right-click on a font and choose properties - for TrueType fonts only. With the plug-in installed, instead of a 2-tab display of the name of the font (and sometimes a version number) you get 9 tabs that tell you things like how many characters are included, whether it includes Unicode extended characters, whether you can imbed it, and quite a bit more. There is a brief description on Alan Wood's site, but the download is free from Microsoft typography.

Alan Wood also mentioned an interesting freeware utility called Character Agent. His description is here or you can get it (for free - if you give them your email addy) from Bjondi.

The Extended Character Map suggested by Bill D appears to display only the "ANSI" range of characters, while Character Agent displays the full Unicode range for your installed fonts. Character rendering in CharAgent is a little weak, but it seems to cover a lot more ground.

John

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 02 Nov 01 - 01:50 PM

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide From: GUEST,Accentless Mrr Date: 14-Jun-00 - 03:23 PM Hi, can anyone find anything in either HTML or Word that will allow for a LONG umlaut, not 2 dots but more like quotation marks that go over a letter, or 2 acute accents together on one letter? I have sought in vain so far and asked on a few random threads... but perhaps y'all might know... Also, is there any way to do a single accent that is perfectly vertical, e.g. neither acute nor grave? The reason I ask is that Hungarian has both those diacritical marks (the neither-acute-nor-grave accent and the long umlaut or double accent) and nobody in my family so far has been able to figure out how to make them using regular software like Word or html. Thanks, all!

I'm not sure if these are what you're looking for, and I'm not up on how to "force" a font in html, but for normal text work a couple of the long umlauts appear to be at:

Font "Times New Roman Special G1" contains two characters, an "o" and a "u" that look right.
Character 0xDE (Hex), 222 decimal - lower case o.
Character 0xF8 (Hex), 248 decimal - lower case u.

Font "Times New Roman Special G2" contains one character:
Character 0x9D (Hex), 157 decimal - uppercase O.

Character 222 shows as a "Thorn" in Times New Roman, so you could type it, it you have that character on your keyboard, (are you using an international keyboard?) and then reformat it to "Times New Roman Special G1.

Character 248 is an "o-slash" in "Times New Roman" so it could be typed and reformatted.

There is no "character" for 157 in "Times New Roman."

Any of the three could be entered by holding down Alt and typing the decimal number on the NumPad (with NumLock ON) with a leading zero (0157, 0222, 0248).

Both of these "Special G" fonts are included in my Win98 default installation, so they are likely to be available, and might be readable in html if you can figure out how to "impose" the font.

John

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 03:43 PM

Hey, can somebody help me out? Quite some time ago, I did s chord posting example for the chords for "Supercalifragilistic." It had the chords posted in color and in Superscript. I worked for hours on it, and now I can't find it. Anybody know where it is?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Noreen
Date: 23 Mar 02 - 08:35 PM

This one, Joe?

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Joe Offer
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 04:22 AM

Yup, Noreen. That was astute. How come I couldn't find it?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Jeri
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 11:17 AM

I looked too, without luck. Supersearch for "supercalif" doesn't pull anything up. Now I can see how the word's broken up. I did a search for "fragilistic" and it came right up. ("supercali" without the F also brings it up.)

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 12:45 PM

I searched (just a little) for chords, HTML, superscript, etc. Usually when I use Supersearch, I try to use a specific word. If I don't know one, I search on the person's name who made the post. An accurate time frame is essential for this type of thing though. I didn't read back as far as necessary to find that one. It seems that I can remember threads I posted to, and a quick "find on page" from my postings will usually turn it up. I think I made a statement some while back that a Mudcatter's memory is often more usueful for finding things than the elaborate searches available to us.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Noreen
Date: 24 Mar 02 - 01:41 PM

Just searched for 'supercali' and it came up straight away- obviously a fortunate choice.

It's good to be able to help you for a change, Joe.

Noreen

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Guy Wolff
Date: 09 Jan 05 - 08:28 PM

HELLO

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: SharonA
Date: 30 Nov 05 - 06:00 PM

---

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: SharonA
Date: 30 Nov 05 - 06:01 PM

---

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: SharonA
Date: 30 Nov 05 - 06:03 PM

Oops, sorry, didn't mean to post those color bars. I keep forgetting to click the "Preview" box!

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide
From: Seiri Omaar
Date: 30 Nov 05 - 07:02 PM

Draac HTML Website
Great site for anyone learning HTML.

Cheers, Seiri.

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide PermaThread
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Mar 07 - 04:28 AM

I came across a nice way to do indents:

<DL>

<DT>He said:

<dd>I want to paint you naked on a big brass bed,

<DD>With bright orange poppies all around your head.

<Dt>And she said:

<dd>Crazy old man, I'm not young anymore.

<DD>Well that's all right, he whispered, I've never painted before.</DL>

---

Finished product:

He said:

I want to paint you naked on a big brass bed,

With bright orange poppies all around your head.

And she said:

Crazy old man, I'm not young anymore.

Well that's all right, he whispered, I've never painted before.

---

The <dl> tag begins a "definition list."
I suppose the <dt> means the term defined
and the <dd> means the definition.

Lots of tips on HTML tags here (click)

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide PermaThread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Mar 07 - 09:44 AM

Joe,

Thanks! I looked in my now somewhat elderly HTML book (it has been time to look for the next edition for a while, necessary at least every couple of years) and don't see this mentioned. I use the old reliable <UL> and </UL>for some indents and block quotes, but it always forces in a blank line space above and below the surrounding text. <br> is one help to avoid the blank space, and sometimes I'll do a <Font="white"> </font> and put an elipsis in that white font when I want an indent to occur.

SRS

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide PermaThread
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Aug 07 - 03:03 PM

I think many Mudcatters misunderstand how to close italics and other HTML tags. They use </> - use </i> to close italics, </b> to close bold, </u> to close underline, and so forth. In general, to close an HTML command, repeat the command, but with a slash in front of it - but be sure to specify which command you're closing. As far as I know, </> doesn't do anything.
There's one Mudcatter who tells me that </> always works for him. I suppose it does seem that way - because there always seems to be some alert JoeClone to drop in and correct his mistakes.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide PermaThread
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 May 09 - 04:01 PM

Somebody asked me how to copy-paste italics into a Mudcat post. It took me a while to do the fancy stuff on my reply, so I thought I'd paste it here in case it can help somebody else.


The only HTML that Mudcat provides automatically is <br> line breaks. If what you're pasting already has those <br> line breaks visible, be sure to UNcheck the "automatic line breaks" box below the message entry box.
But for italics, you have to enter the HTML commands yourself. At the end of the italics passage, you have to repeat the command with a slash in front of it. I'll show you six:

<b>bold</b>
<i>italics</i>
<u>underline</u>
<big>big</big>
<small>small</small>


<blockquote>blockquote (indent)</blockquote>

You can also combine them:

<b><i>bold italics</i></b>

Make sense?
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide PermaThread
From: Joe Offer
Date: 03 Dec 10 - 02:13 AM

http://www.comptechdoc.org/independent/web/html/index.html offers an interesting HTML tutorial.


-Joe-

Subject: RE: Mudcat HTML Guide PermaThread
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Aug 21 - 11:05 PM

Thumbsup: 👍 &#128077;