Is there an ongoing thread for the Italics problem?

[AwkwardMD]

When I post a story, the first two pages (or so) will have removed any spaces between where whenever I add html formatting. Everything after the first two pages (or 7000 words) is correct, and it all looks correct on the submission preview screen, but the pages after posting look wrong.


This is an example of the posted version:

View attachment 2174086

and this is what it looks like in the source document:
View attachment 2174087

This has been going on for years now. I would have assumed I was the one making the mistake, except that I tag the whole document the same way and the problem only appears at the beginning (first two Lit pages, or ~7,000 words).


Please fix please!

 

[dmallord]

When I post a story, the first two pages (or so) will have removed any spaces between where whenever I add html formatting. Everything after the first two pages (or 7000 words) is correct, and it all looks correct on the submission preview screen, but the pages after posting look wrong.


This is an example of the posted version:

View attachment 2174086

and this is what it looks like in the source document:
View attachment 2174087

This has been going on for years now. I would have assumed I was the one making the mistake, except that I tag the whole document the same way and the problem only appears at the beginning (first two Lit pages, or ~7,000 words).


Please fix please!

I've noted this as well when using italic text. Pasting copy into the Lit window and in preview/publish mode it looks ok, but as you noted, not when it is posted. It is called kerning. I have learned to make an adjustment 'to fix' the spacing. Whenever I have text following italic words, I double space and that visually appears appropriate when the stories post. Crazy, but that's what works. Double space after the past punctuation. I also find it happens anywhere, not just after two Lit Pages.

"She's__<I>out!"</I>__Ken said, laughing. "I just__<I>said__</I>that ....

My example has double spaced where you see __ as a marker.

Tough to get HTML to kern correctly I guess. I'm not a coder so I have no idea how that gets adjusted. But my way works.

 

[AwkwardMD]

That's brilliant

 

[RejectReality]

I think there might be something in your original documents that the final text processor is choking on. What format are you submitting in/pasting from? I've never had that issue. Here's one of yours I pulled up with the spacing error.

View attachment 2174453

And here's one of my more recent ones with some italics that display properly.

View attachment 2174454

There's no space between "Ew." and the quotation mark that follows on yours, where you see there's a space between "I thought" and the quote mark, and then again after "to the front" before the quote mark preceding the next italicized section in mine.

What I do with all of mine is save as plain text to ensure all formatting data from the original program is stripped, and then paste from that. I'm reasonably certain that the text processor ( like most everything ) is based upon Microsoft Word, so any other means you use to create the original document has a high probability of being somewhat incompatible. Even if you are using Word, you could be using settings that the text processor doesn't handle well.

It's a pain in the ass, but saving as plain text, reviewing the plain text document for artifacts, and then pasting from that gives you maximum control when you're having persistent errors between submission and final presentation.

 

[ElectricBlue]

It's a pain in the ass, but saving as plain text, reviewing the plain text document for artifacts, and then pasting from that gives you maximum control when you're having persistent errors between submission and final presentation.

This. When I draft and save in .docx I get the italics "no gap" glitch (which doesn't show in the Preview). When I draft and save in .rtf, I don't have the issue. Therefore, .docx is the cause.

When I forget, and use .docx (its saved files are smaller, so its doing something else clever, but possibly too clever), and I see the flaw in the published version I leave it, because I don't use italics much. With this hindsight, I now know why.