Coding for fics

[Jedikatie]

For those who don't know html coding:

<b> </b> = bold text
<i> </i> = italic text
<u> </u> = underlined text

You don't have to put the paragraph or page break markers in. I do prefer that you put the above within the story, however, because it makes my life easier than having to go through and try and catch every single instance of someone italicizing one tiny word in a sentence, however...

Also be sure to list the title of the fic/poem, the author's name (how you want to be listed in the archives, that is, not your real name, unless that's what you go by when writing fics), a rating and to put a disclaimer on it.

[CX]

Just to add to that since it got deleted, to make Jk's life easier, you should be sure to code your paragraphs with

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<p> </p>

so the paragraph breaks show up, and

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<br>

if all you want is for it to go down to the next line (like up in the heading between the title and "By your name".

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<hr>

Does in a snap too for separating the heading and the body.

[dark_rain]

The

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</p>

is actually unnecessary, so you dont have to add it, all that there needs to be for a paragraph break is

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<p>

[Rigil Kent]

I have a coding question ... two actually.

First, what coding is used for a horizontal bar intended to separate a section (like, for example, the body of text and the author's note)? At fanfiction.net, I'm required to manually input <hr> where I want such a break to be inserted. Will that work?

Second, I use a lot of acronyms in my fics and realize that not everyone is as proficient with them as I am. To that end, I've been using some coding on my personal website that would allow someone to mouse-over an unfamiliar acronym and a definition appear. For example, the coding for MACO would be <acronym title="Military Assault Command Operations">MACO</acronym>. Are you capable of doing this? It's an easy thing for me to add as I already have that coding on my personal site. If not, that's cool. I was just wondering, since several reviewers have, in the past, mentioned the acronyms and their lack of knowledge in that respect...

[dark_rain]

Rigil,

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<hr>

is fine,
as is...

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<acronym title="Military Assault Command Operations">MACO</acronym>

[Buurman]

The

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</p>

is actually unnecessary, so you dont have to add it, all that there needs to be for a paragraph break is

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<p>

Actually, it is required according to some of the newer specifications. That or a self-closing tag. However, any browser is able to work without it since it's been used in that regard for two decades or so

I like to add them myself simply because it makes things clearer for me and I like the symmetry.

[Alelou]

I don't add anything I don't have to add. So far your stuff is really short, you know.

I also just hate cluttered notepad pages with gobbledygook all over them. I'm one of those people who would add extra space all over an html file just for clarity's sake and I've even done so a couple of times, but they always change right back to mushed-together gobbledygook that's hard to find anything in before my next shift. So I've learned to live with it, but I hate working with our archive and title files. I sincerely hope THEY get automated someday.

[Buurman]

I don't add anything I don't have to add. So far your stuff is really short, you know.

You mean the general length of my fics? Yeah, they started out that way, especially with L24 it just seemed to fit, especially with all the pov-changes going on in the first few instalments. Though it's successor will probably have chapters up to twice as large ^^

As for the one-shots, well they're basically all just single-scene, and there's only so much you can write about a scene, especially if you insert little to no dialogue.

I also just hate cluttered notepad pages with gobbledygook all over them. I'm one of those people who would add extra space all over an html file just for clarity's sake and I've even done so a couple of times, but they always change right back to mushed-together gobbledygook that's hard to find anything in before my next shift. So I've learned to live with it, but I hate working with our archive and title files. I sincerely hope THEY get automated someday.

I know! I tend to layout the code, with nested tags and all that. I would go something like:

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<div id="blabla">
   <p>
      <ul>
         <li />Yakkerdieyak.
         <li />Hey, one more.
      </ul>
   </p>
</div>


Some simple automation shouldn't be all that hard. At the very least a simple html-file-generator/converter thingy would be fairly easy to code together I would think.

But yeah, I dig you. The site I was admin for was all hand-coded too ... ouch updating member listings. Especially since, one part was my responsibility (I was 'top-admin' for that part) and me and my predecessors kept it clean. I also had to do edits in the other part ....

THE HORROR! THE HORROR!

And like you say, trying to clean it up a little didn't make for any permanent changes.

[mjimeyg]

I sincerely hope THEY get automated someday.

As I type this I am currently uploading files to my test site... files that should hopefully make your dream come true!

In other words I am writing an automated version of TS for Elessar with dark_rain... it is coming along at the mo... just need to finish work on a few bits and then test it.

Edit:

Also, the closing tag

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</p>

is something I use as lets face it, some day the browsers are going to stop supporting the older specifications and API's... I prefer to make sure my code is as future proof as possible!

[Alelou]

Sigh. Okay. I didn't know about </p>.

But automation will make it all okay.

So in regards to fic, does that mean it will be more like fanfic.net -- no gatekeeping, anything can go up? (Can an A/T'Poler sneak on??? )

[Aquarius]

^ Wow, I hope not! One of the things I find very attractive about this site is that there's someone monitoring content and, to a point, quality control.

[mjimeyg]

Sigh. Okay. I didn't know about </p>.

But automation will make it all okay.

So in regards to fic, does that mean it will be more like fanfic.net -- no gatekeeping, anything can go up? (Can an A/T'Poler sneak on??? )

HELL NO!

By automated I meant that all you do is fill in the form and the fic is uploaded, no more having to add the code at the beginning and end or adding the html formatting, no more having to add the links by hand... I figured that Elessar and dark_rain would still only want the fic admins to do the uploading.

If they want anybody to be able to do it then I will discuss tying in the authentication details from the phpboards to save some bother and prevent people needing to sign up twice.

Even if they want everyone to be able to post their own fics, I can't imagine they would allow the fics to be posted before they are approved... so there would have to be some sort of validation system.

[Alelou]

That's good. The line is uncomfortably subjective at times, but that is the essential difference between us and ff.net.

Well, that and the fact that we have Decon.

[Aquarius]

So if I understand this correctly, we can just send the Word documents without html coding?

[Buurman]

Eventually ... the system has yet to be implemented.

Though I don't know if it draws italic, bold and underlined directly from the word document, you might still need to put in such tags. But at the very least the whole process of making a .html file from your .doc file would be automated which would mean that uploading takes less time and there's a smaller chance of errors or inconsistencies.