ptg 96 Chapter 5 In word processing you have all the letters of the alphabet, and you have special characters. Special characters help to further define what you're saying. For example, you could say that your Web site has a copyright date of 2007, or you could use a special character, and say it this way: ©2007. HTML only allows one space between characters. If you want to add more, you can use the Non-Breaking Space command on the Special Characters submenu. The Special Characters submenu also allows you to insert other characters, such as character with accents and other international characters. However, the visitor's browser must support the "other" character inserted for it to be visible to the user; therefore testing is essential. In addition to special charac- ters, you have the ability to add things like the current date and even the time, and have the date/time items automatically update with the passage of time. When you use the Insert Date option your pages will always reflect the correct date. Inserting Special Characters and the Date Insert a Special Character Open the Web page you want to insert special characters. Click to place the insertion point where you want to insert text. Choose one of the following options: ◆ Click the Insert menu, point to HTML, point to Special Characters, and then select a special character from the available options. ◆ Select the Text tab on the Insert bar, click the Characters button, and then select from the available special character options. Dreamweaver places the special character at the insertion point. 3 2 1 2 3 Did You Know? You can add space between charac- ters. Press Control+Shift+Spacebar (Win) or Option+Spacebar (Mac). Special Characters vs Decorative Fonts Special characters are not to be confused with decorative fonts. Some fonts, like Zapf Dingbats, and Symbols, are designed to give you small graphics (like a pointing finger, or smile face) in place of the letters of the alphabet. Special characters are actually coded into the HTML document, so that they produce exactly the symbol requested. For Your Information From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg Chapter 5 Working with Web Page Text 97 Insert Other Characters Open the Web page you want to insert other characters. Click to place the insertion point where you want to insert text. Click the Insert menu, point to HTML, point to Special Characters, and then click Other. Select a character from the available list. A copy of the HTML code used to display the character appears in the insert box in the upper left. Click OK. Add the Date and Time Open Dreamweaver, and then open a Web document. Click to place the insertion point where you want to insert text. Choose from the following options: ◆ Click the Insert menu, and then click Date. ◆ Select the Common tab on the Insert bar, and then click the Date button. The Insert Date dialog box opens. Select the format you want the day and date to display. Select a format for the time (optional). Select the Update Automatically On Save check box to update the date/time every time the page is saved. Click OK. 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 5 4 3 2 1 5 4 6 4 7 5 From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg 98 Chapter 5 Like any other application that process text, Dreamweaver needs a que from you as to what you want to do. If you plan to make a change to the current text, you need to inform Dreamweaver of that fact by making a selection. There are several ways that you can select text in Dreamweaver. The first thing to notice is that Dreamweaver does not have a specific text tool. That's because the cursor is sensitive to the area it's hovering over. For example, if you hover over an image, and click your mouse, Dreamweaver selects the image; however, if you're hovering over a section of text and click your mouse, Dreamweaver turns into a text tool, and create an insertion point into the text. That's why Dreamweaver doesn't have that old familiar Toolbox, like you see in applications such as: Photoshop, Illustrator, and Flash because it's the position of the cursor in the document that automatically deter- mines what happens. Of course, once the text is selected, it can be modified, deleted, even copied. Selecting Text Standard Selection Techniques ◆ Single Click. Creates an insertion point within the body of text. ◆ Double Click. Selects a single word (separated by spaces or a paragraph return). NOTE If the word ends with punctuation (period, comma, etc), they will not be selected. ◆ Triple Click. Selects one paragraph (all text between two paragraph returns; including any punctuation). ◆ Click and Drag. Click within a body of text and drag the mouse to select a group of text. Release the mouse and the dragged text remains selected. ◆ Click release Shift Click. Click once within the body of text and release. Then move to another area, hold the shift key and click once. All the text between the two mouse clicks is selected. Selected text From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg Chapter 5 Working with Web Page Text 99 Select Using the Status Bar Click to place the insertion point where you want to select text, and then look at the Status bar. The tags for the area you've selected appear on the left side of the Status bar. Click the specific tag you want in the Status bar to select the tag within the code. For example, when you click the <p> (paragraph) tag, all the text associated with that tag appears selected. 2 1 Text selec te d us in g tags on the Status bar Did You Know? The tag selector is not just for text. For example, if you choose an image <alt> tag, the corresponding image within the document will be selected. This is a quick and easy way to make selec- tions within complex Web documents. You can use the Select All command to select all of the text within the selected body. Click once within the text body, click the Edit menu, and then click Select All, or press Ctrl+A (Win) or A+A (Mac). From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg 100 Chapter 5 If you cut or copy text from a file in any other application (word proces- sor, spreadsheet, or database), Dreamweaver inserts the copied text at the insertion point of the cursor. Understand that the default Paste command has limited control over the formatting of text: It can only paste plain, unformatted text; bold, italic, or other formatting options are not carried over with the text… unless you're using Microsoft Word. By default, performing a copy/paste command from MS Word retains most font formatting. Unfortunately, unless you change the Preferences of the Paste option, the Copy/Paste commands have lim- ited control over text. For example, you have a heavily formatted sec- tion of text in Microsoft Word and you want to bring the text into Dreamweaver without any formatting because you plan to use a Style Sheet to do all the document formatting. That's where the Paste Special command comes into play. With Paste Special, you can control what formatting options are used when pasting the text. Copying and Pasting Text Copy and Paste Open a text document within your word processor (i.e. Microsoft Word). Select the text that you want to paste into Dreamweaver. Click the Edit menu, and then click Copy, or click the Copy button on the Standard toolbar or Home tab (Vista). Open Dreamweaver, and the Web page you want to add the text. Click to place the insertion point where you want to insert text. Click the Edit menu, and then click Paste. Dreamweaver pastes the copied text at the insertion point. 6 5 4 3 2 1 4 5 Did You Know? You can access the copy/paste prefer- ences directly from the Paste Special dialog box. When you select the Paste Special command, simply click the Paste Preferences button, and you can make your changes permanent. 6 From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg Chapter 5 Working with Web Page Text 101 Copy and Paste Special Open a text document within Microsoft Word. Select the text that you want to paste into Dreamweaver. Click the Edit menu, and then click Copy, or click the Copy button on the Standard toolbar or Home tab (Vista). Open Dreamweaver, and the Web page you want to add the text. Click to place the insertion point where you want to insert text. Click the Edit menu, and then click Paste Special. Select from the following options: ◆ Text Only. Pastes text without formatting. ◆ Text With Structure (paragraphs, lists, tables, etc.). Pastes structured text without formatting. ◆ Text With Structure Plus Basic Formatting (bold, italic). Pastes structured text and simple HTML formatting. ◆ Text With Structure Plus Full Formatting (bold, italic, styles). Pastes structured text, HTML formatting, and CSS styles. ◆ Retain Line Breaks. Select this option to keep line breaks. ◆ Clean Up Word Paragraph Spacing. Select this option if you've chosen Text With Structure, or Text With Structure Plus Basic Formatting, and want to eliminate extra spacing between paragraphs. Click OK. 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 8 7 Working with Word Processing Programs To assi st i n gen er at in g te xt on m y Web pa ge s, I wo rk wi th M ic ro so ft Word and Adobe Dreamweaver open at the same time. This way I'm able to type text in an application I'm comfortable with (MS Word), and quickly drag from my word processor directly into my Dreamweaver Web page. If you're copying text that contains multiple paragraphs, make sure your paragraphs are separated by two returns. When pasted into Dreamweaver, the paragraph breaks are preserved. If you just have a single return between paragraphs, Dreamweaver converts the paragraphs to line breaks. For Your Information From the Library of Wow! eBook . character from the available options. ◆ Select the Text tab on the Insert bar, click the Characters button, and then select from the available special character options. Dreamweaver places the special. character, and say it this way: ©2007. HTML only allows one space between characters. If you want to add more, you can use the Non-Breaking Space command on the Special Characters submenu. The Special. the insertion point. 3 2 1 2 3 Did You Know? You can add space between charac- ters. Press Control+Shift+Spacebar (Win) or Option+Spacebar (Mac). Special Characters vs Decorative Fonts Special