Netscape Composer Tutorial
Working with Web pages

This section provides an overview of Composer's basic text editing features.

Quick Links:

Creating Your First Web Page

Create a page from scratch that you can build on as you learn more about Composer's features.

Summary

1. Choose New|Blank Page from the File menu.
2. Type some text in the Composer window.
3. Choose Save from the File menu or click the Save button and name the file.

Details

1. Choose New|Blank Page from the File menu or click the New Document button on the Composition Tools toolbar.
2. You see the Composer window with a blank page, and toolbars at the top.
3. Choose Save from the File menu (or click the Save button on the Composition toolbar).
4. When you save your file, name it something unique, such as firstpg.htm, and click OK. If you are using an operating system that supports long filenames (such as Windows 95), you can give the file an .HTML extension. (If you skip this step and try to insert a link, the Composer will prompt you to save the file locally before continuing).
5. Type "Netscape Home Page" in the edit window.
6. Select the text you just typed.
7. Choose Link from the Insert menu (or click the Link button in the Composition Tools toolbar).The Link Properties dialog box appears.
8. In the Link To text box, type http://home.netscape.com and then click OK.

Note: http://home.netscape.com is the address, or URL (Universal Resource Locator), for Netscape's home page. Every link in a document has a URL similar to this one.

Once you've completed the steps outlined above, you will have authored a page that links to another page. The underlined text and different color indicate a link to another Web page.

Browsing Your New Page

To browse your new page:

1. Choose File|Save and name the page if you haven't already done so.
2. Choose File|Browse Page to open your newly created page in the Browser window. The Composer window remains open behind the new Browser window.

If you're online (connected to the Internet), right now you can click on the link and view Netscape's home page. If you're not, open this file the next time you connect and test your link.

Entering Text

An overview of how text entry works in Composer

Editing text in the Composer works the same as in most word-processing applications. These features are of vital importance since writing is what you'll spend most of your time doing when creating your Web pages.

As you move the cursor over the Composer window, it appears as an I-beam. When you click the mouse, a small flashing vertical bar marks the insertion point where text typed is placed in the window. You can start typing right away.

The Composer supports the special keyboard characters, such as the ampersand and percent sign. To insert symbols, such as the copyright symbol, run the Windows Character Map application (or use the Key Caps program on the Macintosh). Change the font to Times Roman, copy the symbol you want, and paste it into the edit window.

Note: Choose Edit|Undo to cancel the effects of the most recently performed command (not all actions can be undone). Choose Edit|Redo to perform the most recent action again.

Selecting Text

To select words or blocks of text in the Composer window.

	Double-click before a line to select a paragraph, and after a line, to select the last word or element in that line.
	Double-click on a word to select the word.
	Click before a line to select the entire line.
	Use the mouse to drag and select a block of text.

Tip: Choose Show|Paragraph Marks from the View menu to see where paragraph marks are located in your document--they appear as black rectangles. A short horizontal line appears to indicate the end of the page.

Cut, Copy, and Paste

You can enter text into your document by pasting from almost any source. For example, you can select text on a page you are viewing in the browse window and copy it with the Edit|Copy command. You can then paste it into the page you are currently editing by choosing Edit|Paste.

You can also use the Cut, Copy and Paste buttons on the Composition toolbar.

Tip: In Windows, you can right-click your mouse on selected text to quickly cut, copy, or paste the text.

Note: Unlike the Composer window, text that you cut or copy from the Browser window does not retain formatting information.

Finding Text

Search for text on a page.

1. Choose Edit|Find, or the Find button on the Composition toolbar.
2. Enter the characters you want to search for.
3. Specify a search option.

Details

1. Choose Edit|Find in Page to display the Find dialog box.
2. Enter the characters you wish to search for in the Find What text box.
3. Choose one of the following Search Options:
   1. Match Case: Makes the match case-sensitive. The default ignores case.
   2. Up or Down: Specifies whether to begin searching up or down in the file.
4. Click Find Next to find the text.

Using the Spell Checker

Summary

	Click the Spelling button on the Format Tools toolbar
	Choose Spelling from the Tools menu.

Composer checks for spelling errors using its main dictionary, which contains most common words. If Composer finds a word that is not in the main dictionary, it displays the word in the Spelling dialog box and gives you choices for correcting the possible misspelling.

You can check the spelling of one word, a selection of text, or an entire document.

To check the spelling in the current document, do one of the following:

1. On the Format Tools toolbar, click the Spelling button.
2. From the Tools menu, choose Spelling.

The Check Spelling dialog box appears.

	For each word that is found, choose whether to correct it, ignore it, or add it to the dictionary.
	To return to the document, click the OK button.

About the Check Spelling dialog box:

Word field and Suggestions list - The Word field displays the misspelled word. Click a word in the Suggestions list or type a correction, and then click Replace or Replace All.

Check - Click to check the spelling of any word you type in the Word field.

Language pop-up menu - To use a different spelling dictionary, click this pop-up menu and choose from the list.

Ignore and Ignore All - Click to continue checking without changing the word (or all occurrences of the word).

Learn - Click to add the word to the dictionary. If there are several words in the Word field, each is added the dictionary.

Edit Dictionary - Displays a dialog box to add, replace, or remove words from the dictionary.

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