Section 14.1. Placing Text on the Page

14.1. Placing Text on the Page

One way to add text is to type it directly into your Dreamweaver page. Typing is convenient for short bursts of wordage. At the same time, Dreamweaver isn't a word processor. It doesn't have many of the features that you might want for serious copywriting. You might also find yourself in this situation: you have a stack of documents from the marketing department that your employer is forcing you to add to the site. Marketing content is never fun in the first place, and retyping marketing content is a form of torture under the Geneva Conventions.

TIP

To insert special typographical characters like dashes, curly quotes, the copyright symbol, and the registered trademark symbol, choose Insert HTML Special Characters from the main menu.

Fortunately, Dreamweaver makes it easy for you to paste blocks of text from a word-processor file. If the text is from Microsoft Word, you can even import the Word file directly into your Dreamweaver page.

BEST BET

Typing text directly into your page is fine for short sections of copy, but for longer pieces, you're better off composing in a text editor or word processor and then pasting or importing the text into Dreamweaver.

To copy from your word processor or text editor and paste into Dreamweaver, follow these steps:

1. From your word processor or text editor, select and copy the text that you want to use on your page.

2. In Dreamweaver, click the spot on the page where you want to insert the text, or select the placeholder text that you want to overwrite.

3. From the main menu, choose Edit Paste Special. The Paste Special dialog box shown in Figure 14-1 appears.

   Figure 14-1. Paste Special's options for word processed text

   

   BEHIND THE SCENES

   The options available under Paste As in the Paste Special dialog box depend upon the application from which you copied the text. The more sophisticated the text editor or word processor, the more options you get.

   
   

4. Under Paste As, choose Text With Structure or Text With Structure Plus Basic Formatting. You don't usually want the Text Only option, unless the source document has been poorly formatted by someone in the marketing department. You don't usually want Text With Structure Plus Full Formatting, either, because it gives license for Dreamweaver to write embedded style rules into your page. You're better off applying your own, custom-built styles after you paste the text.

5. Click OK, and Dreamweaver pastes the text into the page.

To import a Microsoft Word document, follow these steps:

1. In Dreamweaver, click the spot on the page where you want to insert the text, or select the placeholder text that you want to overwrite.

2. Choose File Import Word Document. The Import Word Document dialog box opens.

3. Click Open. Dreamweaver imports the document into your page, as Figure 14-2 shows.

   Figure 14-2. Import a Word document directly into your page

   

Once the text is in the page, you can adjust the format and presentation to suit your needs.