Rich Text Editing Questions

1. What is rich text editing?
2. Which browsers support rich text editing?
3. When I post or edit a note, the rich text editor does not appear. Why not?
4. I copied some information from a web page or Microsoft Word document into the rich text editor using "cut and paste", and it doesn't look right. What can I do?
5. When I click the "left", "center", "right", or "justify" buttons, it affects the entire contents of my note instead of just the text I've selected. Why does this happen and how do I fix it?
6. Can I use the rich text editor to mix images or clip art with text?
7. When I edit a note, it's full of strange characters. What happened to my text?
8. How do I disable rich text editing?

What is rich text editing?

Rich text editing is a feature which allows you to edit text that you wish to post on your eBoard in much the same way that you would do so using a word processing program. For example, it allows you to change the font, size, and color of your text; use boldface, underlining, and italics; center or justify text; or create links, all using a graphical interface that makes editing as simple as selecting the text you want to format and clicking the operation you want to perform.

Rich text editing is a new feature and is not yet supported by all web browsers. In addition, some web browsers support rich text editing, but have bugs that prevent it from working properly in some cases. Because of this, some users may be unable to see the rich text editor or may experience problems when using it. In spite of this, the feedback we have received in regards to this feature has been overwhelmingly positive, and most users have found that it has significantly improved their experience with eBoard. However, if you have problems using the rich text editor, you can disable it for your eBoard and use the standard text editor instead (see How do I disable rich text editing?), or (if you have purchased an Academic License) your eBoard administrator can disable the rich text editor on a district-wide basis.

Which browsers support rich text editing?

Rich text editing is supported by Internet Explorer 5 and higher on the Windows platform only, Mozilla Firefox 0.6.1 and higher, Mozilla 1.3 and higher, and Netscape 7.1 and higher. Unfortunately, neither Safari nor the Mac version of Internet Explorer currently support rich text editing. If you would like to use the rich text editor on your Mac, we highly recommend that you install Mozilla Firefox, a free web browser that runs on both MacOS and Windows and also offers a number of other great features, including tabbed browsing and an excellent pop-up blocker. For the Mac download, look for the words "Free Download" and click the link "Other Systems and Languages." If you decide to use a browser which does not support rich text editing, you can still format your notes using HTML. See How do I format the text of a note? for more information.

When I post or edit a note, the rich text editor does not appear. Why not?

The most likely reason is that your browser does not support rich text editing (see Which browsers support rich text editing?).

Another possibility is that rich text editing may be disabled for your eBoard. Follow these steps:

1. Enter admin mode (see What is admin mode?).
2. Look for a link that says "control panel" in the upper right hand corner of your eBoard, and click on it.
3. Look for a check box that says "allow rich text editor". If this box is not checked, check it and then click "Save and Exit". The rich text editor should now be enabled.
4. If the check box that says "allow rich text editor" is not present, and your eBoard is part of a building-wide or district-wide eBoard implementation, your eBoard administrator may have disabled the rich text editor feature.

If you are certain that your browser supports rich text editing and you have rich text editing enabled in your control panel as described above, but the rich text editor does not appear, please contact eBoard customer support for assistance.

I copied some information from a web page or Microsoft Word document into the rich text editor using "cut and paste", and it doesn't look right. What can I do?

Web pages and Microsoft Word documents often contain large amounts of complex formatting information, even if they appear on the surface to be very simple documents. When you copy and paste into the rich text editor, this formatting information is transferred along with the actual text. Even though the original document may have looked great, the formatting information may not work properly when copied into another document, such as your eBoard note.

There are several possible solutions to this problem.

1. If you are a Microsoft Windows user, you can easily strip out this formatting information by copying and pasting into Notepad first, and then copying and pasting from there into your note.
2. If you are copying and pasting from a web page, you may want to consider posting a link to the web page rather than copying it. You can do this by copying and pasting the web address (URL) of the document into your note rather than the document itself.
3. If you are copying and pasting from a Microsoft Word document, you may want to consider uploading the document as an attachment rather than copying it directly into your note (see How do I attach a picture or document to a note?).
4. If the rich text editing feature is not useful to you, you can disable it (see How do I disable rich text editing?).

When I click the "left", "center", "right", or "justify" buttons, it affects the entire contents of my note instead of just the text I've selected. Why does this happen and how do I fix it?

This problem is the result of a bug in Internet Explorer. You can work around this problem as follows:

1. Position the cursor at the end of the line above the text you wish to center or justify. Press shift-enter.
2. Position the cursor at the end of the last line of the text you wish to center or justify. Press shift-enter.
3. Position the cursor anywhere in the block of text you wish to center or justify and click the appropriate button.

Pressing shift-enter sometimes produces an extra blank line that you don't want. If you have this problem, the instead of placing the cursor at the end of a line and pressing shift-enter, try placing it at the beginning of the next line. Press backspace to join the two lines together and then shift-enter to separate them again.

Another solution to this problem is to use a different browser that does not have this bug. We recommend Mozilla Firefox, which is available for free and also offers a number of other great features, including tabbed browsing and an excellent pop-up blocker.

Can I use the rich text editor to mix images or clip art with text?

No, this is not supported by eBoard. You may be able to cut and paste text which contains images into the rich text editor, but we don't recommend it. When your note is viewed, the user's web browser will try to load the image from the web site from which you originally copied it. If the image has been changed or removed, users will see the new image or a broken image icon. In other cases, adding images to the rich text editor may work on your computer but not display properly elsewhere. We recommend that you attach any images you want to use as attachments (see How do I attach a picture or document to a note?).

When I edit a note, it's full of strange characters. What happened to my text?

This sometimes happens when you edit a note using the rich text editor, and then edit it again later without using the rich text editor (see When I post or edit a note, the rich text editor does not appear. Why not?). When you used the rich text editor to edit your note, you were actually creating HTML, which you are now editing directly. This is particularly likely to happen if you copy and paste from other web pages or word processing documents.

One solution to this problem is to always edit your notes using a browser that supports rich text editing (see Which browsers support rich text editing?). Another solution is to view the note and copy and paste the contents into the editor, and then make your changes. If you only rarely use a browser that supports rich text editing, you may want to simply avoid this problem by disabling the rich text editor altogether (see How do I disable rich text editing?).

How do I disable rich text editing?

Follow these steps:

1. Enter admin mode (see What is admin mode?).
2. Look for a link that says "control panel" in the upper right hand corner of your eBoard, and click on it.
3. Look for a check box that says "allow rich text editor" and make sure this box is NOT checked.
4. Click "Save and Exit".