QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS ABOUT FORMATTING TEXT
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What is a Font?

A font is a set of characters with a particular appearance the style. (This is Times New Roman. This is Ariel.) There are hundreds of different font sets available, but it is good idea to limit the number of fonts on a web page to three or less.

What is a point?

Commercial printers measure fonts in points. There are 72 points per inch. Computer fonts follow this standard.

What font sizes are recommended for Web pages?

Headings: 18 pt to 36 pt

Text: 12 pt and 14 pt.

How do I change fonts?

There are at two ways to change fonts in FrontPage: See the font drop down list on the formatting tool bar. The font dialogue box is accessed from the format drop down menu.

Using the font drop down list:

1. Highlight the text you want to change.

2. Click the font down button.

3. Click the font you want.

4. The font will appear.

Using the font dialog box allows you to make many changes to highlighted text:

1. Highlight the text you want to change.

2. Click Format.

3. Click Font.

4. The Font dialogue box appears.

5. Click the font you want to apply to the highlighted text.

6. The font change appears in the preview box.

Next to the font dialogue box is the font style box.

You have four choices:

Regular
italic
bold regular
bold italic

Make your choice, the change appears in the preview box and in the highlighted text.

To the right of font style box is the font size box.

Choices of sizes from 8 pt. to 36 pt .
You may also highlight the font size and then type the size you wish 6, 7, 11, 12.5, etc.

Click on the size you want or change the current font to an unlisted size

The change appears in the preview box and the highlighted text.

You may choose font color the next line of the dialogue box.

A number of options are offered:

1. Automatic (you set that text color here or in the page properties box.

2. Standard colors
You are offered standard colors when you click the color box down arrow
click of the color box you want and the color is applied.

3. Document Colors

4. Click on more colors and you are offered a number of options:
Choose from a color wheel
Enter the hex value of a color and name the color
Create custom colors
Use the eye dropper to match font color to a color in your document.

Next to the font color your may choose styles of underlining.

Choose and underline style and you may choose the underline color.

On the next row you are offered many effects to be applied to the highlighted text.
superscript, subscript, all caps, small caps, etc.

Click on the spacing tab and you may choose

1. Spacing: Normal, condensed, expanded or set the space between letters yourself.

2. Eight choices for the position of the text in the line.

How do I bold, italicize, or underline text?

You use the format buttons just as you use them in MS WORD or in most word processing programs. These are the steps:

Select the text you wish to format.
Click of the button or buttons you want to apply new formatting: [B] Bold, [I] Italic, and [U] underline.
You should see the text change.

How to remove bold, italic, or underlining?

Click the [B] Bold, [I] Italic, and [U] underline button. The formatting will return to its previous state.

Can I apply more than one style to selected text?

Yes, click the [B] Bold, [I] Italic, or [U] underline buttons one at a time.

Why should I change the Color of the text on my web pages?

To make your page more attractive.
To emphasize are certain part of your text.

To make the text more legible against certain background colors.

To make your heading stand out.

How can I change text color?

Use the Font Color Button of the formatting toolbar
Use the Font dialog box (see above.)

How can I make my colors match?

Color is often a matter of personal preference. The first step is to figure out what colors you like to use together. You might want to explore the FrontPage theme colors to see what colors others have chosen. Above all ask others what they think about the colors.

Remember that different browsers and different Internet providers may affect the way your pages appear. Check out your colors on as many different platforms as possible.

How can I change the spacing between characters?

Open the font dialogue box. Chose the Character Spacing tab. See the details above.

FORMATTING ISSUES

Remember that FrontPage uses underlining to indicate the presence of a hyperlink. Underlining text that is not a hyperlink may confuse your users. IT IS RECOMMENDED THAT YOU USE UNDERLINING SPARINGLY.

Applying [B] Bold, [I] Italic, and [U] underline to large blocks of text may make them harder to read.

Remember that not all computers have the same fonts as you have installed on your computer. Choose more common fonts so that your users can see your pages as you designed them.

A successful web page includes a balance of text sizes for different fonts.

The larger the font size, the easier it is to read.
The use of smaller the font sizes, allows more text to fit on the page.

Careful font size selection plays a significant role in legibility.

The default font sizes in FrontPage correspond to the font sizes in HTML, the programming language for the web. These default sizes are believed to look the best on web pages.

Use color carefully to support your message. You can apply as many colors as you want, but it is a good idea to limit the number of colors so that the colors does not distract from the message.

WHAT IS KERNING?

”Kerning” is the same as spacing between characters. Kerning is used to make the text look stretched out or condensed. Sans serif fonts (the letters do not have tails) look better that serif fonts (the letters have tails). Serif fonts are hard to read when they are condensed. Experiment with kerning to achieve the best look for your page.

Click Format, click font, click character spacing, click the down arrow, click either normal, Expanded or Condensed. The default spacing for with expanding or condensing is one point. Use the up or down arrows to increase the default spacing. You can see the results of your work in the preview box. You can also use this dialogue box to change the position of the text in relation to the baseline. You can manipulate the position of your text for the best effect. Remember you can use the undo button to restore our spacing settings.

HOW CAN I ALIGN TEXT?

You have four alignment options: The default alignment is left (It leaves the left edge even and the right edge uneven. Right alignment leaves the right edge even the left edge uneven. Center alignment positions your text between the left and right edges of your page or table cell. To align the text evenly at both the right and left edges.

Select the text you wish to align, click on the left, right, center, or justify buttons on the tool bar. You can also use the paragraph dialogue box to choose the same options.

HOW DO I INDENT TEXT?

What is indenting?

Indenting moves the first line of the paragraph; the entire left side or the entire right side or both the left and right side of the text away from the edges of the page.

FrontPage has three indentation options accessed through paragraph dialogue box.: Before text, after text and first line indentation.

These are the steps:

Highlight the text you want to indent

Click Format

Click Paragraph.

To increase or decrease the amount of indentation before the text, click the up and down arrows in the before text indentation box

To increase and decrease the amount of indentation after the text, click the up and down arrows in the before or after indentation box

To indent the first line, click the up or down arrows in the indent first line box.

A sample of the indentation applied appears in the preview box.

Indentation issues:

The tab key may also be used to indent only the first line of a paragraph, not each line of a paragraph.

Text alignment may have priority over indentation. For example, you may not see the indentation on text that has been centered.

When dealing with large amounts of text it may be useful to establish and apply a paragraph style.

HOW DO I CHANGE LINE AND PARAGRAPH SPACING?

Making adjustments to line and paragraph spacing can make your pages easier to read or to make text fit in a given space.

CHANGING LINE SPACING

Here are the steps:

Select the text where to wish to change the line spacing.

Click Format
Click Paragraph

When the Paragraph dialogue box appears, click the down arrow to see the spacing options and click single, 1.5, or double. The changes are seen in the preview box.

Click OK to see your changes

CHANGING PARAGRAPH SPACING

Select the paragraphs in which you wish to change the spacing.

Click Format
Click Paragraph

When the Paragraph dialogue box appears, click the up or down arrow to change the spacing before or after a paragraph. The changes are seen in the preview box.

Click OK to see your changes.

HOW CAN I USE BULLETED OR NUMBERED LISTS?

Lists help organize topics, items, or names and make them stand out on the page.

Here are the steps:

Select the text you wish to include in a list.
Click Format
Click Bullets and Numbering
When the Bullets and Number box appears become familiar with the options available to you on this page.

Choose “plain bullets” or “numbers”

Click on the style of bullet or numbering you would like to use.

Click OK to see your changes.

Can I use a picture as a bullet?
.

Pictures may be used as bullets, but the pictures must be prepared for use a bullets. Pictures should be resized and prepared for use on the Web. This can be easily done if you are using a program like Adobe Photo Elements. We recommend that you store this picture in your web pictures folder.

Here are the steps:

Select the text you wish to include in a list.
Click Format
Click the Picture Bullets tabs
When the Picture bullets dialogue box appears click specify Picture.

Either type the path or the picture file name or browse to the locate the image file

Click OK to see your picture bullets beside the selected text.

HOW DO I GO BACK TO UN-BULLETED TEXT?

Here are the steps:

Select the bulleted text
Click the bullets button in the formatting tool bar

FrontPage will remove the bullet and will return to the text to the page format.

WHAT IS A STYLE?

A style is a set of predefined formatting attributes. Applying styles give the pages in your site a more consistent look.

HOW CAN I APPLY STYLES TO MY PAGES

Fifteen built-in styles can be assigned from the style drop down list on the formatting tool bar.

HOW ARE STYLES CATAGORIZED?

Styles are categorized as paragraph or character styles.

WHAT IS A PARAGRAPH STYLE AND HOW ARE THEY APPLIED?

A paragraph style contains formatting controls that apply to paragraphs and are identified by the paragraph symbol in the style drop down list. Styles are applied by moving the insertion point to any place in the paragraph. The text need not be selected.

WHAT IS CHARACTER STYLE AND HOW ARE THEY APPLIED?

There is one built-in character style identified by an underlined “a” in the drop down style list. Character styles contain formatting that applies to text characters. You must select text to apply a character style.

CAN I CREATE MY OWN STYLES TO APPLY TO MY PAGES?

Existing styles can be designed or created by modifying existing styles. New styles are added at the bottom of drop down style list.

Two Ways to apply Styles

Use the Style Drop Down Menu

Click anywhere in the paragraph you want to change

or
Select the text to assign a character style.

The current style assigned to the text appears in the style box.

Click the down arrow to view the styles available.

When the list of styles appears, click the style you want to apply.

The style of the selected text appears.

Use the style dialogue box

Click anywhere in the paragraph you want to change

or
Select the text to assign a character style.

Click Format
Click Style

When the style dialogue box appears, click the style you want to apply.

The preview area shows how the text will appear.

Click OK and the style is applied to your text.

You may want to try each of the different styles on new practice page to become familiar to what is available through the style dialogue box.

HOW CAN I CREATE A NEW STYLE?

Creating a style involves knowing how use much of the information precedes this question. Your new style can speeds up the process of formatting new web page text.

Styles are created using the Style dialogue box. This box includes the built-in styles (html tags) and the styles you have created (user defined styles). After you give your style a distinct name following gamaliel.org’s naming conventions (foldername/identifier, e.g. RIC1, RICbold, etc.), you can built your style one element at a time using the various dialogue boxes for fonts, paragraph, etc. Once your style is created, you will find it at the bottom of the style drop down list and in style dialogue box. You may need to change the list box to “user defined styles” to see your new style.

The Style Creation Process

Click Format
Click Style

When the style dialogue box appears, click new

The new style dialogue box appears

Type a name for the new style in the name box.

Click Format

Choose a formatting option.

Apply the formatting options you need and click OK.

Front page saves the new style and lists it in the style dialogue box.

Can I modify an existing style?

Existing Styles can be modified. It is recommended that you save the existing style you want to modify to a new name before you begin the modification process. NOT DOING THIS WILL CHANGE YOUR SOFTWARE, if you save your modified style under the same file name, you loose the predefined style.

This is the process modifying an existing style.

Click Format
Click Style

When the style dialogue box appears, click the style you want to modify.

Click modify
When the modify style box opens, click format.

Apply the formatting options you need and click OK.

Front page saves the modifications to the style you selected.

WHAT IS “THE FORMAT PAINTER?”

The Format Painter is a tool on the Standard toolbar. When you select text and then click the tool, the cursor changes to the format painter cursor. At the same time the font, font size, alignment, etc of the selected text is copied. This format can be immediately applied to other text simply by dragging the format painter cursor over the text to which the format is to be transferred.

This is the process:

Select the text with the format that is to be duplicated.

If you want to copy the formatting only once, click the format once.

If you want to copy the formatting more than once, double click the mouse.

The cursor arrow changes to the format cursor.

Click and drag over the text to which the formatting is to be copied.

The formatting is immediately applied.

HOW CAN A REMOVE FORMATING?

One of the simplest ways is to use the edit undo command. This can be done by clicking the “undo typing” icon or clicking Edit /Undo Typing.

The remove formatting command removes the formatting without removing other changes that that been made to the text.

This is the process:

Select the text
Click Format
Click Remove Formatting
all character and paragraph formatting is removed.

How Can I apply Text Borders and Shading?

Borders and Shading can be used to emphasize text and set it off from the rest of your content.

You will want to experiment with the boarders and shading dialogue box.

Here is the process to create a text border:

Select the text needing a border
Click Format
Click Borders and Shading
The Borders and Shading dialog box will open

Click to box to add a four-sided border around the text

Click a border style.

Click the down arrow in the color box to change the color.

Click the up or down arrows in the width box to set the border’s thickness.

Click the up and down arrows to adjust the padding between the text and the border.

Click OK

FrontPage will apply a Border around your selected text.

The process is similar for adding shading:

Select the text to which you want to add background shading.
Click Format
Click Borders and Shading
The Borders and Shading dialog box will open

Click the shading tab.

Click a background color

Click the down arrow in the color box to choose the color.

Click the down arrow in the Foreground Box to change text color.

Changes appear in the preview box.

Click OK

FrontPage will apply the shading to your selected text.

HOW CAN I ADD A BACKGROUND PICTURE?

Select your text
Click Format
Click Borders and Shading
The Borders and Shading dialog box will open

Type the picture's filename or path in the Background Picture box.

You can also browse to find your file.

The picture position can be adjusted by using the down arrows to adjust the vertical and horizontal position.

Click OK

FrontPage will apply the image to the background of the selected text.

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