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How to HTML 150 pages of text

st4
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.

The lnk below is one small chapter which I just saved a word document
in HTML, however it leaves much to be desired.

http://www.hardyus.com/joestory/grandparents.html
Any suggestions appreciated.

Thanks

Jul 23 '05 #1
10 2138
AES
In article <11**********************@c13g2000cwb.googlegroups .com>,
st*@isp.com wrote:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.

The lnk below is one small chapter which I just saved a word document
in HTML, however it leaves much to be desired.

http://www.hardyus.com/joestory/grandparents.html
Any suggestions appreciated.

Thanks


If you have any experience with word processing or computing, simple
HTML is not to hard to learn. You can learn the necessary HTML for
simple text and for inserting images into documents in a few hours from
an "HTML for Dummies" type book.

Assuming by "text" you mean an online text file, there are text editors
(BBEdit for the Mac is the one I've used) that include easy to learn
tools for HTML markup that you can learn to use with fairly small effort
-- e.g., you select a heading or a paragraph by dragging over it on
screen, type a couple of keystrokes, and it adds the desired HTMl markup
around the selected section of text. Doing this for 150 pages would be
a bit tedious, but could go rapidly once you got started.

There are also "WYSIWYG" type editors built into certain browsers, e.g.
the Composer part of Netscape Communicator. They have a reputation for
producing lousy HTML, however.
Jul 23 '05 #2
Tim
st*@isp.com posted:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.

http://www.hardyus.com/joestory/grandparents.html


There are some tools that will turn plain text into HTML. I'd guess that
they'd just mark apart paragraphs by guesswork, and it'd be up to you to
fancy things up.

What's probably more useful to you, considering your source material (Word
document), to use that program to save out as HTML, then parse it with
something else that fixes up the gumph Word inserts into it. I think the
HTML "tidy" program can do that for you.

There are also tools that can break apart large HTML into chapters,
probably at where the headings are. I think the HTML tidy program can do
that, too.

--
If you insist on e-mailing me, use the reply-to address (it's real but
temporary). But please reply to the group, like you're supposed to.

This message was sent without a virus, please delete some files yourself.
Jul 23 '05 #3
On 22 Jan 2005 18:17:50 -0800, st*@isp.com wrote:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.


150 pages may be a bit much for readabiliity with just html, but 150
pages is a hard go no matter what you use

easy way is to just pdf it. Dress it up in Word, even add your images,
break it up into logical and short (download) sections and post each
section as a pdf file.

save the html for a web page that describes what you are doing,through
a synopsis of the subject matter, and links to each pdf file through
a table of contents.

Otherwise,
consistent and proper use of all the headings, (h1, h2, h3 ..),
margin bottoms and tops on headings and paragraphs for vertical white
space,
lists and indents for horizontal white space,
judicious use of images with text wrap,
and a span or two for text highlights (color, size).
links to each section on each page.

Consider the short horizontal rule between sections or major sections

Single font, some emphasis, few italics. I believe serif is preferred
for readability of lots of text. Link to top at end of each section.
No horizontal scrolling.
no banners to distract

as always allow user to adjust font size

one advantage of html and css (besides being free) is the natural
editing of the text that you will do when marking it up.

who knows, may be able to cut it down to 75 pages.
johnSteve

Jul 23 '05 #4
johnSteve wrote:
On 22 Jan 2005 18:17:50 -0800, st*@isp.com wrote:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.

That depends how you've authored your word document. If, while writing
it, you selected various fonts, colours and sizes manually using those
essentially useless and annoying toolbar buttons, then it's more
difficult. They generally result in the use of various deprecated
presentational elements like <font> and attributes for colours and sizes.

If, however, you've tamed word and use the Styles and Formatting pane in
a way that actually has semantics mind (if you know where to find the
hidden, built-in styles based on semantic inline HTML elements), then
your job may be a little easier.

Some versions of word (Word 2000 and XP I think) offer a "Filtered HTML"
option in the save as dialog. Just ignore the stupid warning that tries
to convince you the other way is better because you'll lose all your
formatting that only works in MS products. It still won't validate or
anything sensible like that, but it will at least lack the mess of mixed
up, illformed application/vnd.ms-tag-soup+xml nonsense, and it does make
HTML Tidy's job easier.

Alternatively, I find it easier to copy the whole content into a plain
text editor like notepad to ensure that all formatting is removed. Then
copy the plain text and paste it into a WYSIWYG environment of an HTML
editor like dreamweaver. The result should be completely unformatted,
yet correctly marked up paragraphs. It's then just a matter of going
through, marking up headings, emphasis (<stong> and <em>) and other
suitable semantic elements. Aftewards, write a simple style sheet to
set suitable fonts, colours, etc.
Single font, some emphasis, few italics. I believe serif is preferred
for readability of lots of text.


That depends on the medium in which it is being viewed. Serifs are good
for readability in high resolution mediums like print, but sans-serif is
good for the screen.

--
Lachlan Hunt
http://lachy.id.au/
http://GetFirefox.com/ Rediscover the Web
http://SpreadFirefox.com/ Igniting the Web
Jul 23 '05 #5
On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 01:35:13 -0700, johnSteve <st****@bresnan.net>
wrote:
On 22 Jan 2005 18:17:50 -0800, st*@isp.com wrote:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.
150 pages may be a bit much for readabiliity with just html, but 150
pages is a hard go no matter what you use
Agreed.
easy way is to just pdf it. Dress it up in Word, even add your images,
break it up into logical and short (download) sections and post each
section as a pdf file.


PDFs are far from ideal for reading on the screen though. And it means
that all the adding of photos and formatting has to be done before the
pages are put on the site. Furthermore, if one then wants to change the
layout (e.g. different background colour) one has to regenerate every
PDF separately.

To the OP: I'd recommend gritting your teeth and doing the conversion to
HTML using just the basic HTML elements, plus - very important - a link
to an external CSS file. You can then immediately put the pages on your
site. Indeed you can add them a few pages at a time; you don't have to
complete the conversion first.

Then you can play around with CSS for the formatting (colours, margins
etc), and all the pages will immediately adopt the new formatting. Then
you can gradually add photos etc page by page.

HTH
--
Stephen Poley

http://www.xs4all.nl/~sbpoley/webmatters/
Jul 23 '05 #6
st*@isp.com wrote in
news:11**********************@c13g2000cwb.googlegr oups.com:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.


You should think about exactly what it is you want to do,
and maybe then ask again for more advice.

For example, is this a "one time" publishing of
"the data" to the web? What about when page 151
needs to be added to the site? What about when
you decide to revise some of the information,
whether it's as simple as fixing spelling mistakes,
or re-writing some paragraphs, adding a new sentence
or paragraph, a new photo, etc? What about the option
of allowing others to add information to the site?

Your example page is on a webserver that uses Apache.
If you can use PHP and MySQL then maybe a PHP-based
solution with "the information" in a database would
provide a suitable solution. Maybe a Wiki?
http://wiki.org/wiki.cgi?WhatIsWiki

--
Dave Patton
Canadian Coordinator, Degree Confluence Project
http://www.confluence.org/
My website: http://members.shaw.ca/davepatton/
Jul 23 '05 #7

"Stephen Poley" <sb******************@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
news:3n********************************@4ax.com...
On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 01:35:13 -0700, johnSteve <st****@bresnan.net>
wrote:
On 22 Jan 2005 18:17:50 -0800, st*@isp.com wrote:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.

150 pages may be a bit much for readabiliity with just html, but 150
pages is a hard go no matter what you use


Agreed.
easy way is to just pdf it. Dress it up in Word, even add your images,
break it up into logical and short (download) sections and post each
section as a pdf file.


PDFs are far from ideal for reading on the screen though. And it means
that all the adding of photos and formatting has to be done before the
pages are put on the site. Furthermore, if one then wants to change the
layout (e.g. different background colour) one has to regenerate every
PDF separately.

To the OP: I'd recommend gritting your teeth and doing the conversion to
HTML using just the basic HTML elements, plus - very important - a link
to an external CSS file. You can then immediately put the pages on your
site. Indeed you can add them a few pages at a time; you don't have to
complete the conversion first.

Then you can play around with CSS for the formatting (colours, margins
etc), and all the pages will immediately adopt the new formatting. Then
you can gradually add photos etc page by page.

HTH
--
Stephen Poley

http://www.xs4all.nl/~sbpoley/webmatters/


Stephen,

You might try NoteTab http://www.notetab.com/ if your file is standard text.
They have both a freeware and Pro edition. I personally use the Pro
edition, but used the free version for several months. I took a text copy
of the book, "Underground," (19,000+ lines) by Suelette Dreyfus, and
converted it to strict xhtml in about 5 minutes--without any problems. Only
the speed of my old PC slowed the process down. I have the same type of
family history project on a back burner and wanted to see what problems I
would run into. The addition of a CSS file would give you any format you
desire. With a little practice, you can get xhtml file to look just about
any way you want it to. I would just have to add my personal header and
footer to make it look like my other website pages. Give it a try. By the
way, I get nothing from them for recommending their editor.

Del Ferguson
Jul 23 '05 #8

"Del Ferguson" <ra********@charter.net> wrote in message
news:Qr******************@fe07.lga...

"Stephen Poley" <sb******************@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
news:3n********************************@4ax.com...
On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 01:35:13 -0700, johnSteve <st****@bresnan.net>
wrote:
On 22 Jan 2005 18:17:50 -0800, st*@isp.com wrote:

Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.

150 pages may be a bit much for readabiliity with just html, but 150
pages is a hard go no matter what you use


Agreed.
easy way is to just pdf it. Dress it up in Word, even add your images,
break it up into logical and short (download) sections and post each
section as a pdf file.


PDFs are far from ideal for reading on the screen though. And it means
that all the adding of photos and formatting has to be done before the
pages are put on the site. Furthermore, if one then wants to change the
layout (e.g. different background colour) one has to regenerate every
PDF separately.

To the OP: I'd recommend gritting your teeth and doing the conversion to
HTML using just the basic HTML elements, plus - very important - a link
to an external CSS file. You can then immediately put the pages on your
site. Indeed you can add them a few pages at a time; you don't have to
complete the conversion first.

Then you can play around with CSS for the formatting (colours, margins
etc), and all the pages will immediately adopt the new formatting. Then
you can gradually add photos etc page by page.

HTH
--
Stephen Poley

http://www.xs4all.nl/~sbpoley/webmatters/


Stephen,

You might try NoteTab http://www.notetab.com/ if your file is standard
text. They have both a freeware and Pro edition. I personally use the Pro
edition, but used the free version for several months. I took a text copy
of the book, "Underground," (19,000+ lines) by Suelette Dreyfus, and
converted it to strict xhtml in about 5 minutes--without any problems.
Only the speed of my old PC slowed the process down. I have the same type
of family history project on a back burner and wanted to see what problems
I would run into. The addition of a CSS file would give you any format
you desire. With a little practice, you can get xhtml file to look just
about any way you want it to. I would just have to add my personal header
and footer to make it look like my other website pages. Give it a try.
By the way, I get nothing from them for recommending their editor.

Del Ferguson


Group,

By the way, I didn't mean to reply to Stephen about the conversion problem.
I was a little tired last night when I wrote my response. It was meant for
ST4--at least I think that was the original thread starter. I also didn't
mention that the file I converted ended up to be 1MB--it would be very slow
if accessed by a dial-up modem. Again, it wouldn't be that hard to convert
each chapter to an individual XHTML (or HTML) page. Changing things to be
the way you want them is just a matter of adding a CSS file, reading down
through the document, highlighting, and using the options provided in
NoteTab. Works for me.

Del Ferguson
Jul 23 '05 #9
st4
Thanks, everyone. Lots to think about. I'll check out the links
suggested, try a short chapter and go from there.
Steve

Jul 23 '05 #10
st*@isp.com wrote:
Help, As part of my family history web site i need to get 150 pages of
typed text into some format to display. It just text right now but I
would like to add some graphics (photos) and make the text more
friendly to read. I am thinking to divide it into smaller chapters and
to format it something like a newspaper article. But just learning
about HTML, 150 pages just seems like too greater task. Is there a
shortcut or another way to do this.


I do this kind of thing often, taking many pages of text and turning it
into HTML. I use a program called UltraEdit where I copy the plain text
from whatever document I have to convert and paste it into UltraEdit. I
then make sure I have a blank line between each paragraph and then
search and replace the blank line with: </p>blank line<p> and it's all
placed nicely in paragraphs. I can then go through setting headings and
other markup as needed.

You must learn some HTML to work this way though.

--
Stan McCann "Uncle Pirate" http://stanmccann.us/pirate.html
Webmaster/Computer Center Manager, NMSU at Alamogordo
Coordinator, Tularosa Basin Chapter, ABATE of NM; AMA#758681; COBB
'94 1500 Vulcan (now wrecked) :( http://motorcyclefun.org/Dcp_2068c.jpg
A zest for living must include a willingness to die. - R.A. Heinlein
Jul 23 '05 #11

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