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barton cole :: veni, vedi, vero scripsi
 Sunday, January 04, 2009
It's funny - this is a new thing, this "blog" - funny word, that - and working with it will be like having a relationship. No, not like a relationship, but it will be a relationship. And, per yesterday's snippet of a post, I'm working on customizing the thing, so I can have it look and behave the way I want - just like an ignorant man might try to manipulate his wife. But since we're pushing around zeros and ones (with me? the whole electronic binary thing?), I can do what I want. Who knows, maybe I'll spend more time with this than I do with my wife…
Really, though, it's intriguing to develop a relationship such as this. For instance, I bought a laptop a couple of years ago, and since it was a machine I was going to use exclusively as my own, not like my desktop computer in my library at home that we all use, I could customize the interface, install software I wanted, and make it just the way I liked it. Took some time to get it set up to my satisfaction, but we're plenty satisfied with it (and in the interest of full disclosure, it's a PC - which I prefer to Macintosh, but, unlike many of the militant Mac users I know, I'm not going to cast judgments - and in the interest of full disclosure, I know PC owners who are the same way - truly, I would have one of each if I could afford it).
I spent some time yesterday altering the look of the page, having started with a provided theme, but it's the other stuff, too, that needs modification, as we do the little dance of figuring out how to configure the thing to suit my needs and desires.
For example, I like to type with Word, since, although I made hubristic reference to what an excellent typist I am, I really depend on Word's "autocorrect" function. Yes, I am one of those who types, "teh." Word fixes it for me. Maybe I think I'm a good typist because my tools correct my errors before I realize I'm making them…? At any rate, I can type pretty fast.
I tried that trick - creating the text with Word (I've done that when composing long emails, too), then pasting it into the entry page to make a blog post, but the formatting was all wonky. Selecting all the text and fiddling with the font and size and all that did nothing - the paragraphs, every time I had hit the return key, had lots of space before and after, like a fifth-grader's report ("two typewritten pages" - sure, with 16 pt type, and double-spaced…).
So here's what I've discovered I need to do:
1. type the text with Word;
2. spell-check it;
3. copy it, then open NoteTab (an excellent little piece of software I use for writing html for hand-coded websites -- I use the Pro version, since it was so useful I wanted them to have some money), and paste the text into it.
4. from there, I copy it - which has now stripped all the formatting, except for case and line-breaks;
5. and finally, paste that into the blog entry page -
6. and then post it.
Lots of steps? Not necessarily. I end up with something I like. Easier than trying to get the blog software to overcome the formatting that Word has crammed in there.
We're figuring it all out.
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