Sunday, September 18, 2011

Housekeeping- Make your Comments Stand Out with Formatting

Blogger doesn't make formatting available in the Comments Section, so if you'd like to add BOLD or ITALICS to make your comment stand out, you're out of luck unless you add 'meta tags,' which is a techinical way to get around the problem

PLEASE CREDIT MIKE FISK for these tips;

 

What is a Tag?

Very simply, a tag is something enclosed in angle brackets <>.  For example, <b> is the tag for “Turn Bold On”.
When your readers’ browsers (Internet Explorer, Firefox, whatever) encounter tags that they recognize, they will replace these tags with formatting.

Don’t forget the End Tag.

Note that each of the tags we are using here, work in pairs. That is, there is a Begin Tag and a corresponding End Tag which starts with a slash /. For every <b> (bold on), there must be a corresponding </b> (bold off).  This is important.

Bold

Surround the text that you want to appear in BOLD with <b> and </b> tags.  Example, type this into the comment box:
  Sometimes I just want to <b>shout</b>!
Readers will see this:
  Sometimes I just want to shout!

In summary, to  add BOLD cut and  paste this into your comment,  

<b>message here</b>  

Of course, substitute 'message here' with what you want to appear in bold.

Italics

Enclose the text you want to appear in italics with <i> and </i> tags.  Example, type this into the comment box:
  I thought, <i>Hang on a minute, Defrag!</i>
Readers will see this:
  I thought, Hang on a minute, Defrag!

In summary, to  add ITALICS cut and  paste this into your comment,  

<i>message here</i>  

Of course, substitute 'message here' with what you want to appear in italics.

Bold and Italics

Bold and Italics can be combined provided they are nested correctly.  Example:
  I shouted: <b><i>Look Out!</i></b>
Readers will see:
  I shouted: Look Out!
This is an example of incorrect nesting.  The </i> should come before the </b>  Don’t do this:
  I shouted: <b><i>Look Out!</b></i>

In summary, to add BOLD & ITALICS, cut and paste this into your comment,  

<b><i>message here</i></b>

Of course, substitute 'message here' with what you want to appear in bold & italics.


Hyperlinks

Including a Hyperlink in a comment is very similar to Bold and Italic. Hyperlinks use the <a> (for “Active”) tag.
Step one is to enclose the text you want to appear as a hyperlink with <a> and </a> tags.  Example, type this into the comment box:
  You should read <a>MikeFitz's post</a>
If you leave it at that, readers will see this. Note that the hyperlink doesn’t work yet:
  You should read MikeFitz’s post
Step two is to include the address that you want to link to in the opening <a> tag.  This is done by including href="" in the tag. Then place the address between the two "" characters.  (The address is the thing that starts with http://. You probably already know that you can copy the address from the address bar at the top of your browser.)
For example, here we have added the href="":
  You should read <a href="">MikeFitz's post</a>
Finally, here it is with the address placed between the two "" characters:
  You should read <a href="http://mike.brisgeek.com/2006/08/30/simple-html-for-formatting-blogger-comments/">MikeFitz's post</a>
And here’s what readers will see:
  You should read MikeFitz’s post

In summary, to  add a clickable LINK cut and paste this into your comment,  

You should read <a href="">MikeFitz's post</a>

<a href="http://reference site">site name here </a>  

Of course, substitute 'http://reference site' with the actual site address which you can copy and paste and substitute 'site name here' with the actual text that you'd like to  appear as clickable.



Finally, to make sure that your 'tags' are working use the 'PREVIEW' button, located under the Comment box, to see if everything is appearing as it should, before publishing. If all is well you can publish your comment or go back and edit it.

5 comments:

  1. oops! You need to fix your highlighted example for copy/paste for Bold&Italics.... you have them incorrectly placed! Just fyi....

    Otherwise, a great explanation.

    ReplyDelete
  2. To Anon Above;

    MANY THANKS! the change is made.....

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow this post is very informative. thanks for sharing this postt

    ReplyDelete
  4. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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