This article is about fundamental differences between using web based content editors and traditional desktop word processors.

Web based content editors have emerged in a big way as an important component of the bloging generation.  In their essence, web based content editors model their desktop ancestors, (word processors, like MS Word) fairly well but there are some fundamental basic differences that need to be addressed for folks who are new to them...

Both web based content editors and their desktop word processor counterparts have in common a familiar tool bar above the content area where you type content.  The tool icons have a very similar look and identical functionality such as the font chooser, font size chooser, a bold B button for making selections bold, paragraph and text style modifiers, bullet and number list buttons, etc. etc. etc. (the list goes on and on...)

There is a major difference between web based content editors and desktop word processors however and it is this major difference and how to deal with it correctly where folks seem to often stumble.  The major fundamental difference is how information gets ultimately stored under the hood...  For a desktop word processor the data gets stored usually as some fancy  internal company format that is designed to hide complicated internal mechanisms from the user who sees almost exactly what the document will look like once printed so he/she is free, more or less, to get his/her work done easily.  (most of the time that is)

This is called WYSIWYG or (what you see is what you get), pronounced (wizzy wig). In the old days of word processing, (even before desktops) you had to go to school and learn complicated formatting codes (just like HTML programmers do today) just to write a memo on that big, ugly, fancy, word processing system, that coasted your company over $10,000 and upward to put into your office along with the crew of consultants and trainers who would come by and flirt with all the secretaries for $100 bucks an hour once or twice a month!  Today, you can do so much more with MS Office, or Word Perfect, or, even better - the open source suite from SUN Microsystems called: "Open Office Suite" (more about that much better modern innovation based on open web standards in a later blog)

So back to that major difference...   The internal data format used by the web based content editors, as you may have already guessed, is HTML.  While HTML or, (Hyper Text Markup Language) is a very nice standard format that pretty much defines the web, it kind of poses some restrictive requirements on a web based WYSIWYG word processor designed to hide its details from a journalist or office secretary.  These restrictions are problematic and  hard to get around or hide from the end user.

One of the things that is hard to hide is the concept of RAW TEXT.  Content elements in HTML are most always encapsulated by markers called <TAGS>, (hence the name "markup".  These tags define the boundaries between the format of one content element and the next content element.  One of the most basic HTML tags is called the paragraph tag.  It looks like this <P>.  But its not the lowest common denominator element in HTML.  There are things lower than that like the BODY and the HEAD.  Plain text is not well defined outside of what may be defined by the body tag which may or may not be accessible within the context of a web based content editor. (you can display a raw text document with no HTML at all perfectly well inside a web browser.  (try it... create a plain text file using the common program called notepad, and then read it using the file/open menu of your favorite browser and you will see a bunch of plain unformatted text.)

The problem is that raw text gets formatted by a web browser based on the browsers internal default settings which can change from one computer to the next, and is out of the control of the webmaster who's job is to insure content is rendered to the right size or font or what ever is needed to fit the proper style of his/her website.

Most desktop word processors define the paragraph element as the absolute lowest common denominator and in fact don't even need a tag for it other than the operating systems character that defines a new line or carriage return which is created at the hardware level on your computers keyboard when ever you type!  When a raw text document is read by a fancy desktop word processor it automatically converts everything between any new line character, or carriage return character, (oops! now theres an antiquated term!) or both, (depending on the operating system) into the basic and well defined paragraph element and everything always looks nice as soon as you begin typing on your keyboard.

Well designed websites use style sheets which define the why in which content is displayed inside a web browser when you view it on the web.  If you are using a web based content editor on a site that uses style sheets and you can select those styles from a drop down selection box, you are in luck! because its easy to take raw text from an ugly undefined state to a nicely formatted well organized state almost effortlessly by simply selecting some text or placing your cursor inside a paragraph and then choosing one of the styles from the drop down selection box.  In web content editors you MUST to do this by default however.  Its not good enough to just type text in the editor window and hope that its going to come out looking good like it does in a desktop word processor.  In a desktop word processor you can be lazy and just type and it most of the time comes out pretty nice and prints out just as nice...  This most likely will change in the future of course...

Bottom line:  The bare minimum thing you must do when entering text in a web based content editor is to set your text to the "paragraph" element. (usually done in a drop down selection box initially labeled -- Format --) Then your text will end up looking similar to how it looks when you use a desktop word processor just by typing the text alone.

Ben Sheppard - Founder Director - Global ICT Systems Inc.
+1 646.512.1972 (mobile)
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