Blockquote, div, fieldset and form for the simple minded

[dalewood]

Whenever I push the "Indent items" I am presented with four choices of Blockquote, div, fieldset and form.

I have read the descriptions in the Flare help and realize if all i want to do is "indent", I don't want the 'form' option.

As a standard response, I just push OK and select a blockquote and text seems to indent. However, I suspect this causes me problems later on when I want to Outdent later on in the topic and it is not available.

What words of wisdom would folks have out there if one is only trying to format text simply in a topic and just wants an indent to indent, outdent to outdent and perhaps get a tab to work like a tab (I know I am pushing it) and really don't need to delve into the world of XML (i.e. I just want to type, format text like a word processor)?

Are there any setting somewhere to get this editor to just allow me to type at least to the simple level of a word processor? This is the one area where I miss Robohelp.

Please recommend something other than stylesheets. Been there, done that, don't need that level of complexity

Thanks much...

[LTinker68]

There is no "tab" functionality in HTML and therefore not in Flare, beyond that pressing the tab opens that screen you were mentioning. (I think pressing tab will open the screen. I usually click the indent icon.)

If you don't want to worry about the stylesheet at all, then really your only option is the blockquote. The blockquote tag, like the list tags, has a default indent value. You can change it through the stylesheet, but if you leave it as is, you'll get the default, which is probably around 40px-ish. And clicking the outdent button should work to remove the blockquote. If it doesn't, then you can probably right-click on the blockquote block in the show tags area and select unbind, but I'm pretty sure clicking the outdent icon works with the blockquote.

Any other options in the indent options screen will require you to specify a margin-left value in the stylesheet. (Ignore the fieldset one, too -- I'm not entirely sure why that's an option there, but whatever.)

[wclass]

...
As a standard response, I just push OK and select a blockquote and text seems to indent. However, I suspect this causes me problems later on when I want to Outdent later on in the topic and it is not available.

Blockquote is the simplest. The indent icon works the same as the TAB key.
If you want to indent text on the fly (without using a mouse) - use the TAB key to start, and select blockquote, then type your indented text. When you are finished, press SHIFT-Tab and you are back to normal typing. The "outdent" icon also works fine on "blockquote" text - even if you "outdent" a paragraph in the middle of the text, the blockquote tags are correctly reset.

[dalewood]

thank you for the comments.

why is outdent sometimes, many times for me, grayed out, when I am in an indented state (that was one of the reasons for asking the question in the original post)?

[LTinker68]

It might not be available if you have some of the text selected. The cursor needs to just be sitting in the line somewhere. Also, if the cursor is near the beginning or end of the block of text, then there's a chance that the cursor could actually be inside the opening or closing tag, although you can't really tell that you're inside the tag. If you just left-click somewhere in the middle of the line/paragraph then click the outdent icon you shouldn't have a problem.

Plus, the outdent doesn't work with all tags. It should work with all of the options in the indent screen (blockquote, div, form, etc.) and in lists, depending on which level/list type you're in (second level goes to first, etc.). But it won't work with other tags, like the base paragraph tag. It might work with a paragraph class -- it might remove the class and reset it to the base paragraph tag -- but I've never actually tried that to see if it would work. Likewise, I've never tried using the outdent when I'm in a div with a class to see if it would reset it to a plain div tag.

[dalewood]

Thanks much for the tips.

I'll double check that nothing is selected and try moving the cursor to various spots within the text the next time Outdent does not work. It has happended enough times that I really suspect a problem with the editor.

I only use the BlockQuote, remember I am simple minded, as I really don't know what the other options do. I am just trying to get indent to indent and outdent to outdent

These are the times I really miss RoboHelp. I like its editor a whole lot more as it was much friendlier to folks that just wanted to format text like a word processor.

[NorthEast]

Please recommend something other than stylesheets. Been there, done that, don't need that level of complexity :)

To be honest, you probably do need to understand a small amount about styles and HTML tags if you're going to use Flare, I'm not suggesting you need to be an expert, but a bit of knowledge will make your life a bit easier.

Did you get anywhere with the suggestions from your last post on this?
http://forums.madcapsoftware.com/viewtopic.php?t=6144