WordPress.com

1. rktesting
   Member
   Aug 13, 2007, 7:14 PM

   Is there some html code I can put in a page that would dictate how long the lines of text can be?

   I want to do this because the fixed width of the main body text in most themes is narrower than I want (i.e. the margins are too wide).

   On the other hand, there are themes such as 'Silver Is the New Black' which make the lines run almost the width of the browser window (minus the widget zone), which is longer (wider) than I want.

   Those are the only two choices in the available themes, AFAIK: roughly 6 inches on most themes; or, full-screen-width on a couple of the themes.

   many thanks

2. abbydonkrafts
   Member
   Aug 13, 2007, 7:55 PM

   You can control it if you purchase the CSS upgrade.

3. rktesting
   Member
   Aug 13, 2007, 10:12 PM

   Okay, thanks.

   So now I would like to know....

   Would you say the CSS upgrade a good way to start teaching myself html?

   I'm very computer literate, I'm teaching myself C++ now, I know bits and pieces of Visual Basic, I've done stuff like edit the registry, I use specialized statistics software.....

   so I know I *can* teach myself html, the question is whether to use a book, or online tutorials, or just jump in with something like this and read the forums.

   thanks

4. raincoaster
   Member
   Aug 13, 2007, 10:17 PM

   No. No, no, no, no, no.

   If you don't already know CSS, do not buy the CSS upgrade. We get so many complaints from people who've borked their blogs because they don't know what they're doing. Learn it first, then buy the upgrade. It won't take you long to learn, but until you do, don't get the upgrade. You can easily render your blog unreadable.

   WordPress.com has quite a lot of formatting restrictions; basically, if you don't want to use CSS and you don't want to line edit the code for every entry (a horrible process) you're stuck picking from the templates available. If you need more control than that offers, you've got to do the CSS thing, the line editing thing, or you've got to go to a different host.

5. timethief
   Member
   Aug 13, 2007, 10:35 PM

   I'm in agreement with raincoaster. Please also note that there is no staff support for learning css customization and staff will not "fix" anything that you bork. This is why the css customization upgrade is not recommended to those who do not have css experience. Check out this link for more information personalizing your blog css customization

6. abbydonkrafts
   Member
   Aug 14, 2007, 12:55 AM

   You can play around with the Custom CSS option before purchasing it. It gives you the option to Preview any CSS you provide, but the changes won't stay (so your blog is safe). So, if you want to learn, feel free to experiment with the CSS that way. Of course, it's easier to save your blog HTML to a file and experiment offline. That's what I'm doing for porting a theme for use with Sandbox.

   If you do save the HTML file, make sure to strip out the Snap preview, Quantcast and Google scripts. Otherwise the dang things keep trying to load.

   Once you are comfortable with CSS (and that may take a long time) if you are dabbling in learning too many things right now) and feel like it's worth it to purchase the upgrade, then go for it. But definitely don't do it until you can read a CSS file and understand everything in it. :-)

7. seanmurray
   Member
   Dec 21, 2007, 11:25 PM

   You can also use the indent function on the WHOLE post, repeatedly (i.e. indent an entire post you have already indented) if necessary. Worked for me.

8. raincoaster
   Member
   Dec 22, 2007, 12:42 AM

   Depending on your theme, however, it may do some weird formatting. Mine really sets off blockquotes, for instance.

   If you want a column or two narrower than the default, you can make a table in HTML, which is fairly simple. You can also do it in Word and paste it in, but you must be VERY careful to close all your tags in that case. Word is notorious for messing things up if you're not paranoid about cleaning up after it.

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