To see all of the formatting tools, click the “Toolbar Toggle” button.
Note that hovering your mouse over a button will pull up a label that tells you what the button is (and the keyboard shortcut if applicable).
The tools
Indicate the importance of text, not just the style
Since this class is about maintaining the contents of a site, we’ll leave the styling for another class.
(Search the PDC site for WordPress classes to see if we have an intermediate or advanced class on the schedule.)
As you maintain the content of your site, mark the various section headings using the numbered heading levels, and adding styles to them will be easy. Generally, as the number gets higher the font gets smaller to show that it’s a more specific heading.
Heading 1 (H1)
H1 are typically the page title or headline. You generally only want one H1 on a page. The WF College One Pro theme automatically puts your page title at the top of the page as an H1. The H1 is the most important heading on the page.
Heading 2 (H2)
H2 are typically used for headings of major sections. Usually a little bit smaller than H1.
Heading 3 (H3)
H3 are typically used as subheadings of the H2 sections.
Paragraph
Consider this the “normal” text for most of the body of your page.
Heading 4, 5, 6
Are not used as much as headings 1-3 typically. They also are used as sub-subsection headings.
While the formatting options do change the size and weight of text, that is not their primary purpose. The primary purpose is to semantically mark a page. Search engines (like Google and Yahoo) use the semantic markup to help their search results. For you, this means better markup of your page can help improve your pages’ search engine indexing and results.
Pasting from Word and other programs
Copying and pasting text in your WordPress site is basically the same as anywhere else on your computer. However, there are two special Paste buttons, for pasting text from Microsoft Word or when you want to et rid of all of the extra formatting and metadata that was in the source material. Click the button for a special box in which to paste your content.
The first Paste button (with the T) is the Paste as Plain Text button. This will strip all formattingand extra codes from the text before it’s inserted into the page or post.
The second Paste button (with the W) is the Paste from Word button. Usually all of the formatting from Word will be preserved, but without this button, a bunch of extra code that Word creates will also be pasted. It’s very important to use this button or the Paste As Plain Text button when pasting something from Word, as the extra, hidden codes that Word will include along with the text you copy may be visible to your visitors or may mess up other formatting within the page.
Next: Creating a New Page