Text Align problem with Contribute 3 and CSS/XHtmlsite

[ajy]

I see no one has replied to this since it was posted last year but I wanted to
say I have the same problem.

I just have a basic site with some CSS and all of a sudden something I did has
apparently made the the text align buttons in Contribute to be greyed out.

This is a major problem for me and any help is greatly appreciated.

[emily b]

I'm also having this problem and would like to reiterate the need for a solution. Thanks.

[cwillsjr]

I'm having this very same problem... anyone figure this out?

[mzanime.com]

Strange. I have not had this one happen to me before, and I have no clue as to
how to create this situation. But you guys CAN do your own investigation of the
problem.

For instance, the table/div/paragraph which your text is inside of, does it
contain an editable region? if the parent table cell is outside the editable
region then Contribute adding <td align="right"> or whatever would not be
possible. True, it -could- add a paragraph tag inside of the <td> but since I
can't see code I can only make elaborate guesses as to what the issue might be.

Lets say for example, that the template was created with editable regions like
this:

<h1><!--Editable-->text here<!--EndEditable--></h1>

<p><!--Editable-->text here<!--EndEditable--></p>

in this case, of course Contribute can not alter the alignment of the above
element, because its container is locked, and Contribute can not (or, should
not) nest a block-level element inside of another block-level element. if
everything in code appears to be normal it may be a good idea to look at the
"roles and permissions" area of the admin panel.

[Michael Eichelsd?rfer]

I would LOVE to have this "Problem" (as you name it). In XHTML strict "old
style attributes" like the align attribute are not allowed. So you should not
use them if you want to write good code. My problem is just the other way
round: Dealing with a valid XHTML strict site, Contribute still allows to apply
those attributes, thus destroying the validity of the code. Still I don't know
if this is seen as a bug or a feature (in the eyes of Macromedia)...

[mzanime.com]

Which leads to my next question- why are you validating as strict? Do you have some speacial reason to do so, or are you doing it just to say that you've done it? :-)

[Michael Eichelsd?rfer]

I see "mzanime.com" is a funny guy. "Just to say that you've done it" is the
reason if you still use XHTML transitional. You can say "oh, sure I am using
XHTML" (which may still be tag soup...).

Using XHTML strict enables you to separate content and design. You can easily
create different designs for screens, handhelds or print. And you can change
the design of a whole site by changing some lines in your CSS files.

If you use, let's say, the align attribute in your source code, your design
and your content are definitely mixed up.

Maybe you will be convinced if you read Jeremy Keith's article:

[url]http://www.adactio.com/articles/display.php/CSS_based_design[/url]

Greetings
Michael

[mzanime.com]

>> I see "mzanime.com" is a funny guy. "Just to say that you've done it" is
the reason if you still use XHTML transitional.

>> You can say "oh, sure I am using XHTML" (which may still be tag soup...).

It's not tag soup if your code (whether strict or transitional) validates. The
W3C provided both settings for people who want their page to render
"reasonably" okay in older browsers and they provided the strict setting for
those who don't necessarily have a need to support older browsers, and don't
wish to use deprecated (but still supported) elements.

>> Using XHTML strict enables you to separate content and design.

No it doesn't. CSS is what enables you to seperate content from design. (or
presentation, as some word it.) XHTML is merely the bridge between HTML and
XML. XHTML (hopfully with the proper MIME type support in IE7) is what will
allow web pages to truely be well-formed and thus can be interpreted by
XML-compliant reading devices.

But speaking of design for "screens, handhelds or print" what do you think the
CSS @page, @handheld, and @print media rules are for? You certainly don't need
to have a "strict" page to utilize these.

>> If you use, let's say, the align attribute in your source code, your design

and your content are definitely mixed up.

You might say so, but my design will still validate, and my image (or whatever
element) will stay aligned all the way back to Internet Explorer version 1.

And why should I read Jeremy Keith's article, when I have already read many
great articles from Eric Meyer, Zeldman, Tantek, Bert Bos, The W3C, etc?

[Michael Eichelsd?rfer]

:-)

I see you know what you are talking about. Thanks for putting things so clear
(which is hard sometimes for Germans like me with some sort of "rotten school
English").

The transitional standard has been described many years ago to allow by the
W3C to allow a "transition". Now, years later, the transisiton should be over
in my eyes. It's possible (even if it's tricky sometimes because of CSS
rendering bugs...) to generate CSS designs that render perfectly on any browser
which came out since 1999 (IE 5). Regarding my websites older browsers will
still display the content, and the site will still be usable. I don't care
anymore for the beauty of the site on IE 4 or NS 3 - people who still use these
ancient browsers probably won't care about it either.

Back to the topic: Does anyone know how "greying out" of Contribute functions
is triggered when you use XHTML markup? Maybe a special comment?

<!-- startNonDestroaybleStrictCode -->

Michael

[ron_c]

I've been struggling for days to figure out how to center some text in the
editable region of a template page with lots of CSS. This is not pretty but it
is a workaround for this type of situation.

Go to Role Settings
Click on Styles and Fonts
Select Style support: HTML tags (<font face="...">)
Check all boxes EXCEPT "Include CSS styles in the Style menu

Click on Edit Page
Highlight the text you want to align (center, left, right)
Click on the styles drop down menu underneath the Publish button. These will
probably be your h1, h2, h3... styles. Pick one. The text will change to that
style. With your text still highlighted, click on Format in the toolbar and
make the appropriate changes to your text.

I hope this is helpful to someone.

[robothouse]

We have this issue as well. It's horrible!
I tried what ron_c suggested, but alas it did not work.
We'll have to look at tweaking our template's CSS. There are some text
alignments that must be there to draw the page properly on all browsers (damn
you IE!)