Examples of text formats

This article (originally a post) shows what each of the preferred text formats looks like when published on the RSNSW site.  The appearance of these formats differs from what is shown in the supposedly WYSIWYG editor, because it is controlled by the site’s CSS.  This is a device used (among many other things) to give a characteristic look to a site, but it can be defeated if post authors do not adhere to a set of ground rules.  The first of these is: keep the title of the post or article (above) to as few words as possible.

Avoid the excessively ‘shouty’ formats Heading 1 and Heading 2.

Heading 3 – use this for the detailed title, e.g. the lengthy title chosen by the lecturer, or the lecturer’s name, but preferably not both.

Heading 4 – use this for essential information about (e.g.) place and time.

Heading 5 – this can be used for sub-headings of the main text.

Heading 6 – avoid this one, which is smaller than Paragraph text.

Paragraph bolded looks the same as Heading 5, but can be used on specific words within a line of text, whereas Heading 5 will control the entire line.  Note that the text colour of the above formats changes automatically between black, grey and a specific shade of red.  It is best to confine the bolded effect to a couple of words used as the paragraph heading.  If you want emphasis within the paragraph text, use italics.

Paragraph not bolded – use unbolded Paragraph for the main text.

Choices such as Span, Code, Section and Article are not used in our CSS, i.e. give the same appearance as Paragraph.

 

 

Address – this has a different look from Paragraph, and you may find a use for it.  But note that it does not appear italicised on the site, contrary to its appearance in the editor.  It also requires the addition of an empty paragraph above to obtain the usual separation from previous text.

Each of the above formats is obtained by highlighting the text in question and selecting the required format from the drop-down list which by default shows the word Paragraph.  The drop-downs for Styles, Font family and Font size are not used, i.e. are left in their default positions.  If you import text from elsewhere by copy-and-paste, i.e. ctrl-C and ctrl-V, it will import its own specifics of font.  These should be disabled by reselecting the default settings ‘Font family’ and ‘Font size’.  However, the WYSIWYG editor is not good at removing existing formatting, and you will need to toggle to the HTML display to delete unwanted formatting which persists.

Figure captions – this is the only format which you need to set specifically: highlight the caption text and select Italic, then from the drop-down menu ‘Font size’, select 8pt.

I am going to link the RSNSW Endnote style here.