Claris Home Page lets you work with text in some of the ways that you would in a standard word processor. You can insert text, cut and paste from another page or another document, find and replace text, and check your spelling. You can use several levels of headings, apply styles, change the size of text, change the text font, and change the color of text.

Be aware, though, that HTML imposes certain limitations on your text formatting. For example, HTML doesn't let you change spacing between words or lines, add tabs, or change how words are hyphenated. Other limitations arise because viewers use different types of browsers and different platforms. If a browser window is set to a different size, the layout you carefully arranged on your page may look considerably different. Although you can't predict exactly how text will appear to your viewers, you can test the appearance of text on different browsers they are likely to be using.

Opening a text file

You can open text files in Claris Home Page that you created in other applications. Choose Open from the File menu. When you save the file in Claris Home Page, it is saved as an HTML document.

The following feature is only available in the complete version of Claris Home Page 2.0. When you're ready to upgrade, choose How To Upgrade from the Help menu.

Note You can add a special HTML tag to existing HTML files to stop Claris Home Page from editing the HTML code. For more information, see Working with HTML and Java applets.

Typing text

You can add text to your Web page by typing it directly onto the page, by copying and pasting it from another Web page or application, or by dragging it from another page in your Web site. On the Macintosh, you can drag text from another application as well.

You can delete text by selecting it and pressing Delete, and undo your last action by choosing Undo from the Edit menu or pressing 3-Z (Macintosh) or Ctrl-Z (Windows). See Cutting, copying, and pasting for more information about copying and deleting elements in a Web page.

As you type, the lines of text in a paragraph run continuously and wrap evenly regardless of the size of the window. The text you type also wraps evenly in the viewer's browser window no matter what size it is.

Press Return (Macintosh) or Enter (Windows) to end a paragraph of text and insert a paragraph break. Claris Home Page adds an extra line after each paragraph.

If you want to make a paragraph break without adding the extra line, choose Line Break from the Insert menu.

Macintosh: You can also press Shift-Return to insert a line break.

Windows: You can also press Shift-Enter to insert a line break.

Note You can choose to have Claris Home Page show line break symbols or hide them in Edit Page mode. To show line break symbols, choose Preferences from the Edit menu. Then choose General from the pop-up menu or click the General tab to display a new set of options. Select Show Line Breaks, and click OK.

Tip You can use a transparent image to control line spacing by inserting it between lines or paragraphs and adjusting its size in the Image Object Editor. For more information, see Adding transparency to an image.

Finding and replacing text

You can find and replace strings of text, including text characters, words, phrases, and keyboard symbols, such as the ampersand (&).

To find and replace text:

  1. Choose Find/Change from the Edit menu.

    The Find/Change dialog box appears.

  2. Type the text you want to find in the Find text box.
  3. If you want to replace the found text, type the replacement text in the Replace With text box or if you want to delete the found text, leave this box blank.
  4. Choose the options you want to use.

    Choose this option

    To do this

    Partial Word

    Find any instance of the word you are searching for, even if it is in another word (for example, to find the word "walk" in "walking"). This is the default setting.

    Entire Word

    Only find the text if it appears by itself without any other characters.

    Case Sensitive

    Only find exact matches of the text, including case. For example, "Coffee" would find "Coffee" but not "coffee." Leave unchecked to ignore case.

    Search Backwards

    Search backward from the insertion point instead of forward.

    Wrap Around

    Search through the page again.

  5. Click the appropriate button to perform the search.

    Choose this button

    To do this

    Find

    Find the text you typed in the Find field.

    Replace

    After a successful find, replace the found text.

    Replace All

    Replace all instances of the found text with the text in the Replace With field.

    Replace and Find

    After a successful find, replace the found text and search for the text again.

  6. Click Done.
  7. If you want to perform another find, choose Find Next from the Edit menu.

Applying styles to text

Use Claris Home Page to apply standard HTML formatting styles to paragraphs and to individual characters or words easily. In Edit Page mode, choose a style and Claris Home Page adds the appropriate HTML tags to the text or paragraph for you.

Using paragraph styles

You can use paragraph styles to add different level headings, lists, quotes, and bylines to your Web pages.

When you apply a paragraph style, the change affects all of the text within the paragraph. In most cases, if text within the paragraph already has a character style, it adopts the paragraph style in addition to the character style. For example, if you make the first word in a paragraph italic and then make the paragraph into a heading, the paragraph becomes a heading with the first word set in italics.

To apply a paragraph style:

  1. Select the paragraph or group of paragraphs you want to format.
  2. Choose the style from the Format menu.

    Choose one of these styles

    To do this

    Normal

    Remove Headings, Preformatted, Address, or List styles.

    Preformatted

    Format the text of the paragraph to display in the monospace font used by the user's browser. This causes all of the characters typed to have the same width so you can use multiple spaces to line up text exactly how you want it to look. If your viewers' browsers support tables and you want to present text in multiple columns, you might want to use a table instead. For more information on tables, see Adding tables to your Web page.

    Address

    Format your byline or address so viewers can find it easily. When bylines and the email address of a Web page's author are included in a Web page, they are usually placed at the bottom of the Web page, separate from other text.

    Headings 1-6

    Format headings at six different levels, where Heading 1 is the largest.

    Bullet List, Numbered List, or Other (Term, Definition, Directory, and Menu list items)

    Format paragraphs into items in a list. You can choose from several different types of lists depending on the information you are presenting. For more information, see Creating a list.

    The following feature is only available in the complete version of Claris Home Page 2.0. When you're ready to upgrade, choose How To Upgrade from the Help menu.

    Number Style

    Label the list items using alphabetic or numeric characters.

    Blockquote

    Format a paragraph as an extended quotation by indenting both the left and right sides of the paragraph.

    Alignment

    Align text to the left side, center, or right side of the Web page.

Using character styles

Character styles include physical and logical character styles, font, color, size, and raw HTML.

Characters formatted with a physical style look the same no matter what browser you use as long as the browser you use supports that physical style. Characters formatted with logical styles appear differently depending on how the browser you are using interprets that style. For example, in one browser text styled "emphasis" may appear in italics while in another browser it might appear underlined.

Note If your viewers use browsers that do not display physical styles, use logical styles throughout your Web pages whenever you can. This way, each browser can work within its own limitations to interpret the information you want differentiated in a consistent way.

Here is how Claris Home Page displays the logical styles it supports. Remember, they may look different in other browsers.

To apply a character style:

  1. Select the characters you want to format.
  2. Choose a style from the Style menu.

    Type of style

    Choose one of these styles

    To do this

    Logical styles

    Strong

    Indicate the text is very important.

    Emphasis

    Indicate the text is important.

    Citation

    Indicate that the text is from a book or other document.

    Inserted

    Indicate that the text has been inserted into the document.

    Deleted

    Indicate that the text had been deleted from the document.

    Sample

    Indicate that the text is a sequence of literal characters.

    Keyboard

    Indicate that the text is keyboard input.

    Variable

    Indicate that the text is a variable.

    Code

    Indicate that the text is code.

    Physical styles

    Bold

    Make text bold.

    Italic

    Make text italic.

    Underline

    Make text underline.

    Strikethrough

    Make text strikethrough.

    Superscript

    Make text superscript.

    Subscript

    Make text subscript.

    Teletype

    Make text teletype.

    Font

    None

    Make text display in the default font of the viewer's browser.

    Other

    Type a list of fonts separated by commas (for example, Helvetica, Ariel, Courier). The text will display in the first listed font found on the viewer's system.

    (Font name)

    Make the text display in the font specified. (If the font is not available on the viewer's system, another font will be substituted.)

    Size

    1 to 7 (3 is the default)

    Make the text larger by choosing a larger number (or Increase) or smaller by choosing a smaller number (or Decrease).

    Color

    Red, Blue, Green, Yellow, Black, Default, Other

    Make the text a different color. For more information, see Changing the color of text.

Removing character styles

To remove a physical or logical style from text, select the text and choose Plain from the Style menu. To remove all character styles from text, select the text and choose Reset from the Style menu.

Changing how text is displayed in Claris Home Page

You can change how text is displayed in Edit Page and Preview Page modes without affecting the actual character styles of the text.

Note This procedure does not change the way text is displayed in your Web pages for your viewers on the Web.

To change how the text is displayed in Claris Home Page:

  1. Choose Preferences from the Edit menu.
  2. Choose Fonts from the pop-up menu or click the Fonts tab.
  3. Choose a font type and size.

    Change the proportional font settings to set how normal or plain text appears. Change the monospaced font settings to set how text appears in form fields and with the Preformatted or Teletype styles.

Adding special characters

If you want to add special characters (such as the copyright symbol) to your Web page, your keyboard may not be encoded to let you type the character. In addition, even if your keyboard is encoded to let you type the character, depending on your system the character may not display correctly when your viewers view your Web page. You can use the Raw HTML character style in Claris Home Page to make sure that such special characters display correctly on your Web page.

HTML recognizes the International Standards Organization (ISO) Latin-1 character set. Each character in the ISO Latin-1 character set is assigned a numeric entity. If you want to use an ISO Latin-1 character in your text, you can enter the numeric entity for that character as raw HTML in Claris Home Page and the actual character is displayed when you preview your Web page in a browser or after you close and reopen your Web page.

For a complete list of all the characters in ISO Latin-1 and their numeric entity names, see Special characters.

To enter a special character:

  1. Switch to Edit Page mode, if necessary.
  2. Type &#, the number for your special character, and a semicolon (;).

    When you add &# before the number, the number is recognized as a numeric entity for a special character.

  3. Select the &#, the number you typed, and the semicolon, and choose Raw HTML from the Style menu.

    The characters you typed appear in red. The special character appears when you view your page in a browser, and it also appears in Claris Home Page the next time you open the file.

Tip If you are inputting many special characters within a paragraph of text, such as accented characters, you can input all the text in the paragraph as Raw HTML for convenience.

Creating a list

There are several ways you can format text to help you organize information on your Web page. Using lists is one popular method. You can create five kinds of lists using Claris Home Page: bulleted, numbered, glossary (term and definition), menu, and directory lists.

The first step in creating a list on your Web page is deciding which kind of list to use.

Use this kind of list

For this type of information

Bulleted list

Items that don't necessarily follow a sequence (also known as an unordered list). In this kind of list, a bullet precedes each item.

Numbered list

Items that need to be listed in a sequence (also known as an ordered list). In this kind of list, a number or letter precedes each item, which you can specify.

Glossary list

Terms that might be unfamiliar to the user. Glossary lists consist of terms that are followed by their definitions.

Menu list

A list of short items (less than a sentence long) that don't necessarily follow a sequence. Menu list items are not preceded by special characters, numbers, or letters.

Important Menu lists are being phased out of HTML so their use in Web pages is discouraged.

Directory list

A list of short items (less than 20 characters long) that don't necessarily follow a sequence. Directory lists are similar to menu lists, except that some browsers display directory lists in two or more columns rather than one column.

Important Directory lists are being phased out of HTML so their use in Web pages is discouraged.

Note When you create a numbered list in Edit Page mode, you see a number symbol (#) or an X in front of each entry. The actual numbers or letters only appear when you view your page in Preview Page mode or in a browser.

Entering and formatting list items

You use one method to create bulleted, numbered, menu, and directory lists and a different method to create glossary lists. For a glossary list, you enter and format separate list items for the term and the definition.

To create a bulleted, numbered, menu, or directory list:

  1. In Edit Page mode, type the list items, starting each item on a new line.
  2. Select the list.
  3. From the Format menu, choose Bullet List, Numbered List, or Other (and choose Menu or Directory from the submenu).

    You can view the results in Preview Page mode or in a browser.

The following feature is only available in the complete version of Claris Home Page 2.0. When you're ready to upgrade, choose How To Upgrade from the Help menu.

To create a glossary list:

  1. Choose Other from the Format menu and then choose Term.
  2. Type the first term and press Return (Macintosh) or Enter (Windows).

    The insertion point is indented and the format changes to Definition.

  3. Type the definition for the first term and press Return (Macintosh) or Enter (Windows).

    The insertion point moves back out to the left margin and the format changes to Term.

    Repeat steps 2 and 3 for each glossary term and definition you want to create.

    Tip You can tell what the format is for text by clicking the text and looking at the pop-up menu in the toolbar. The format name changes in the pop-up menu when you click text that has a different format.

Inserting a list entry

You can add items to an existing list without having to reapply the list's style.

  1. Click at the end of the line that is above where you want to enter the new item.
  2. Press Return (Macintosh) or Enter (Windows) to insert a list item.

Creating a nested list

A nested list is a list within another list.

  1. Type the list and the subcategory list. Start each item on a new line.
  2. Select all of the text.
  3. Choose the list style you want to apply to the text from the Format menu.

  4. Select the text you want to nest.
  5. Choose Nest List from the Format menu or click the Indent button .

You can apply a different list style to the nested list.

To remove the nested list style, choose Un-Nest from the Format menu or click the Outdent button.

Reordering items in a list

You can drag list items to a new position in the list.

To select a single list item that you want to reposition, you need to select the entire item (including the paragraph return at the end of the line).

  1. Triple-click the item you want to move.

    If you want to move more than one item at a time, hold down the Shift key and select the items.

  2. Drag the selected item or items into the left margin of the new location.

Note If you change the order of numbered list items, they're renumbered automatically.

  1. Changing the number style in a numbered list

There are five number styles you can use for a numbered list.

To change the number style:

  1. Select the numbered list.
  2. Choose Number Style from the Format menu and select a number or alphabetic style.

    In Edit Page mode, you see number symbols (#) or X's in the list. You can view your page in Preview Page mode or in a browser to see the actual numbers or letters.

The following feature is only available in the complete version of Claris Home Page 2.0. When you're ready to upgrade, choose How To Upgrade from the Help menu.

Checking your spelling

Claris Home Page provides a spelling checker to help you polish your writing. You can check all the text in the document, or text that you select. You can also use the spelling checker to count the number of words in your Web page or selection.

To check

Do this

All the text in the document

Choose Check Spelling from the Edit menu.

A selection

Select the text you want to check. Choose Check Selection from the Edit menu.

Once you choose either command, the Spelling dialog box appears and Claris Home Page begins checking for questionable words.

The spelling checker verifies the words you are checking with those in the main dictionary, which was installed in the Claris folder in your System folder, or with whatever is the currently selected dictionary. If it does not find a word, it suggests alternatives. If the spelling of the word in question is correct (such as the spelling of someone's name), you can add the word to a user dictionary by clicking Learn.

The following feature is only available in the complete version of Claris Home Page 2.0. When you're ready to upgrade, choose How To Upgrade from the Help menu.

Changing dictionaries

To change the dictionary that Claris Home Page is currently using, choose Select Dictionaries from the Edit menu.

Editing dictionaries

To edit words in your user dictionary, choose Edit User Dictionary from the Edit menu. In the dialog box, you can edit dictionary entries, import dictionary entries from a text file, or export the contents of a dictionary to a text file.

Changing the color of text

You can change the color of all of the text on your Web page or you can change the color of selected text. Colors assigned to selected pieces of text are character styles and therefore override the colors you assign as the default color for text on your Web page.

To change the default color for all the text on a Web page:

  1. Choose Document Options from the Edit menu.

    The Options dialog box appears.

  2. Choose Basic from the pop-up menu or click the Basic tab to see a new set of options.

  3. Click in the Text box.

    A Color dialog box appears.

  4. Select the color you want for the text and click OK.
  5. Click OK again to close the Options dialog box.

Note To change all options to their original settings, choose Document Options from the Edit menu, and then choose Advanced from the pop-up menu or click the Advanced tab. Click Use Defaults, and then click OK. Your links revert to their default color, any text not assigned a specific color character style reverts to the text default color, and any image background disappears.

To change the color of selected text:

  1. Select the text.
  2. Choose Color from the Style menu and then choose one of the pre- defined colors or choose Other for more options.

    If you choose a pre-defined color, the color is applied to the text you selected. If you choose Other, a standard color dialog box appears. Click on the color you want, and click OK to apply the new color to the text.

Windows: If you want to define a custom color, click Define Custom Color in the Color dialog box. For more information how to set a custom color, consult your Windows documentation.

Note To change the color of selected text back to the default color, choose Color from the Style menu, and then choose Default.

Using horizontal rules to separate text

You can use horizontal rules to separate your Web page into sections.

To create a horizontal rule, place the insertion point where you want the horizontal rule to appear and choose Horizontal Rule from the Insert menu.

Claris Home Page inserts horizontal rules of a size commonly used by many Web page designers.

To change a horizontal rule:

  1. Double-click the horizontal rule to open the Horizontal Rule Object Editor.

  2. Change the settings as appropriate, and then apply the settings by pressing Tab or clicking the close box of the Horizontal Rule Object Editor.

    Use this horizontal rule attribute setting

    To do this

    Height

    Change the height of the rule.

    Width

    Change the width of the rule.

    Percent/Pixels

    Set the width of the rule in Percent or Pixels. Percent changes the rule width to the chosen percentage of the browser window width. Pixels changes the rule width to the chosen width, measured in pixels, regardless of the browser window's width.

    Alignment

    Change the alignment of the rule.

    Shade

    Make the rule look recessed. Deselect to make the rule solid.

    The following feature is only available in the complete version of Claris Home Page 2.0. When you're ready to upgrade, choose How To Upgrade from the Help menu.

    Extra HTML

    Add other HTML attributes to the rule. (This is an advanced feature that requires knowledge of HTML; it specifies additional parameters for the <HR> tag. For more information, see Setting extra HTML preferences)

Note You can also use the mouse to change the height of a horizontal rule. Click the rule to select it and drag the handle at the bottom of the rule to change the rule's height.