webpage formatting and style tips

simple html code examples and tips for creating content on businessballs space

Here are some tips and code examples for using simple html code for formatting webpages, chiefly for styling webages and Bawls (blogs) on Businessballs Space, however the instructions and code examples apply to creating all webpages using html code.

You can cut and paste the code examples on this page into the webpage editor, and then alter the text within the code for your own purposes.

This page also includes some general tips about Businessballs Space resources upload and general navigation.

The Businessballs Space content (webpages and Bawls) editing tools will be improved progressively.

The Space webpage editor and Bawl (blog) editor accept most html codes, and the main common examples are explained briefly below.

The Space webpage editor was upgraded in March 2007 and behaves differently to the previous one.

In general the functionality and user-friendliness of the new webpage editor are dramatically improved over the previous editor, but experienced html users and website designers will notice that some flexibility has been lost (for the time being). We took the decision that offering a vast improvement for the majority of users was most important. As ever, 'workarounds' will be discovered for most of these coding challenges, which we will show here in due course.

how to format your bawls and webpages

The Space Bawls and webpage creators accept webpage code.

The commonest and easiest webpage code is called html (hypertext markup language).

Individual pieces of code are called html 'tags'. These html tags are not case- sensitive.

Tags contain a coded instruction, appearing in angled brackets, for example: <BR> or <br> (which makes a line-break).

Where html affects a section of text, there are closing tags, which effectively switches off the instruction.

For example:

<P>These are the opening and closing tags for a paragraph.</P>

<B>These are the opening and closing tags for bold type.</B>

The closing tag has a forward slash before the html instruction.

Here are some more examples.

simple html code tags examples

You can use these tags in Bawls and webpages to style and format your content.

Space editor tool-buttons will soon enable these options automatically. Meanwhile enjoy using a little html.

<P>opening and closing tags for a paragraph</P>

<B>opening and closing tags for bold type</B>

<BLOCKQUOTE><P>indent paragraph</P></BLOCKQUOTE>

<h1>big main heading</h1>

<h2>medium heading</h2>

<h3>sub-heading</h3>

<h4>small sub-heading</h4>

bullet points, numbered lists

Here is the code to make a bullet point or a list of bullet points:

<UL>(at the start of your list)

</UL>And you need this closing tag for the 'list' of bullets, even if it's only one bullet.


Use the same format for a numbered list, except replace UL with OL to start and close the list:

<OL>(at the start of your list)

  1. <LI>point one</LI>
  2. <LI>point two</LI>
  3. <LI>point three</LI>
  4. <LI>point four</LI>
  5. <LI>and so on...</LI>
  6. <LI>(individual numbered points need closing tags)</LI>

</OL>And again you need this closing tag for the 'list' of numbered points, even if it's only one point.

font colours

<FONT COLOR="red">changes the colour of your text</FONT>

Substitute the colour name to suit your style. There are many acceptable colours. "Gray" requires the US spelling. So does "darkgray" although strangely "lightgrey" requires the UK spelling.

Here is an excellent webpage code colour guide.

webpage background colours

Changing the webpage background colour is not easy at the moment I'm sorry. If you fancy trying a little html code, then webpage background colours are possible using a 'workaround' shown on the webpage colour sample page.

Experienced html users might notice that the usual html BODY BGCOLOR tag does not work in the upgraded Space webpage editor.

We took the decision that the new editor offers so many advantages for the big majority of users that losing a little of the more complex coding flexibility was a necessary sacrifice. We will improve this aspect when we can.

In the meanwhile the best method we can suggest for changing page colour is to use the table command - i.e., one big single-cell table containing the 'BGCOLOR' code. You will need a reasonably good understanding of html to achieve this, which is explained in the the webpage colour sample page.

A simpler tool-button solution for webpage background colour will be added as soon as we can do it.

uploading image files

This is now achieved via the 'insert image' tool button.

links

<A HREF="http://website address of link destination">will create a link from the enclosed text to the link destination</A>

<A HREF="http://website address of link destination" target="_blank">will create a link from the enclosed text to the link destination which opens in a new window</A>

other code and short-cuts

More tips and code examples will be added to this page.

Meanwhile there are plenty of good guides to html code on the web.

uploading articles

You can upload your articles through 'my resources'. Again ensure you are logged in and in the admin screen, which produces the 'my bawls/my profile/etc' left-margin menu links.

Uploading through 'my resources' should accept all common media file formats. File size limit is 15MB. Total space limit is initially 100MB. Let me know if you want more. And why.

general navigation for creating and uploading

Space is actually quite a simple 'flat' website. There are four main functions so far: profile edit, creating webpages, writing bawls, and uploading resources (files, tools, articles, etc).

The create and edit and upload (admin) functions are only one, two or three levels down from the 'my bawls/profile/resources/webpages' links in the left menu list (assuming you are logged in and in the admin screen).

Like anything new, using the Space will take a little while to master. The functionality and layout are however designed to be ultimately very intuitive and uncluttered, and everything will improve.

As ever, the advantages and rewards of early adoption come at the price of pioneering. I am grateful to all of you who take on the challenge, and I will do my best to ensure that those of you who build a positive presence on Space have reason to be glad that you made the investment.






ac rev 09/07