As a result of Jim's new posts, he has asked me to write about the ways in which items may be sent to him for insertion into the web site and/or the Gazette. More specifically the format of the material sent. So often we get material we cannot handle easily simply because it is sent in a format we cannot do anything with because we do not have the program it was prepared in. For example, I have one huge program on my PC but only use it once in a blue moon to print and extract text within files we are sent perhaps three times per year at most. However, this can be so easily over come by saving in a different format which can be read by the vast majority of word processors and DTP programs, i.e. text format.

Text files are literally just that, text. They have none of the special formatting relevant to the native program. So often these days this includes styles, page layout information, and fonts etc. A file which is purely text contains only text, i.e. the words and characters - and that is ALL we want but how do you do it?

To start with, simply write your article and by all means save it in the program's native format, whether it be .doc, .lwp, .wpd, vp, p65 or whatever (all genuine formats). However, when your article is finished, before sending anything to us, please go to the file menu and select Save As (this certainly applies to word processor programs but DTP may well be somewhat more involved). This displays a dialogue box which, normally towards the bottom, has a Save as Type or Files of Type area or similar. In this area select Text (.txt) as your save format and having done this, enter the filename for saving (normally above the area for selecting the file type). This can be the same name as the native file format since the file will be saved with a different extension, e.g. .txt, to differentiate it from the native file format whatever that may be. Choose where you want to save it in the normal way and press Save/OK or whatever button the dialogue box shows for executing the save. If you've saved it to your hard disk then you can either copy it floppy disk for mailing or emailed to us as an attachment. The process is very straight forward and should not give any problems. Apart from this it is always worth getting to know your word processor better as it'll allow you to save your files in other formats as well. One such format is HTML.

HTML is the format that web pages are created in and if you so desire you could create a web page for yourself in your word processor and put it up on the internet. However, a word of caution! Not every word processor has an option to save a file as HTML - the facility may exist for the program but it may not necessarily be installed as it is not automatically part of the installation procedure. If you are in this position you will need to install the HTML option but remember, some word processors may not have the option at all in which case you're stuck.

For those that do have the HTML feature in their word processor, then you can save as HTML in the same way as you do for text files. However, since it is not a feature I use I am not at all familiar with it and as such I cannot be sure what sort of results you are likely to get. An example of what can be done though is the Current Eastern Centre Web site (at least until a rebuilt site is uploaded).
Jim is planning on offering clubs the option to have a page on the web site but to do so would much prefer to have files in HTML and the procedure above would give a bare bones process for saving such a file. This in turn would make life so much easier for him to include the data on the Eastern Centre web site.