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Formatting and layout of poem destroyed.
Forums:
I hate the fact that I've only been here one day and I'll I have done so far is complain. However, I have been persuaded to raise a matter here.
I have two problems with how both the poem submission and blog posting facility distort the layout of a poem.
I have no problem with the standard 'look' of the site, which provides a 'level playing field' for everyone who considers that words are the medium by which poetry paints pictures. However, when I write a poem the layout on the page is very important to me. If I post a poem somewhere and the 'look' of it is altered beyond recognition it is, to my mind, no longer my work. This site (both the 'submit a poem' and 'blog' facilities) seems to do two things which render my poem. They are as follows:
1] Automatically double-spacing - when I want to double space something I feel I ought to be able to do so myself.
2] The site doesn't seem to be able to handle long lines - my free verse lines are often deliberately long, it's a point of choice, style, and deliberate effect. The site chops the ends off my long lines (and sometimes the beginnings) and puts the excised words on a fresh line.
The HTML text format does not seem to be WYSISWG in any sense, so no matter what I try I am surprised by the end result.
Can something be done about these aspects?
Thanks,
Marie.
(c) Neopoet.com. No copyright is claimed by Neopoet to original member content.
andrew
Sun, 2011-04-10 14:20
Yes
First of all, welcome to Neopoet!
I looked at the poem you posted -- I believe you copied it from Microsoft Word or another word processing software.
Unfortunately, Word includes a number of hidden tags. Because we only allow some, but not all, of these tags, these distort how the poem looks. You will have more luck if you submit the poem as plain text and then make edits (if needed) from there.
You can select "Plain text" under "Text format" (right under the poem body) -- it should be the default for you when you submit a new poem.
Let us know if you need any other help.
Marie Marshall
Sun, 2011-04-10 16:58
Thanks Andrew
Hi Andrew.
I tried 'plain text' but ended up with something worse. :-(
I'll go and tinker with it again, maybe tomorrow.
M
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentandrew
Sun, 2011-04-10 17:04
I've given this some thought and tried a few things
I think I understand your frustration -- give me a few hours and we can try something new.
Marie Marshall
Sun, 2011-04-10 17:14
Tinkered
Hi Andrew
I went back and just typed it all in, using plain text. That kinda works, although the result is a wee bit bald.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentMarie Marshall
Tue, 2011-04-12 02:14
Direct typing
Hi Andrew.
I just tried to type in a new poem and to add italics to the text. The whole thing came out as a block of continuous text with no line breaks, so I simply deleted it. Very frustrating! I'm afraid that if these problems. which seem to defeat me every time I want to enter a poem here, aren't addressed then I will not see much point in being here on Neopoet. I don't think I'll be alone in that! :-(
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentscribbler
Sun, 2011-04-10 16:05
hello Marie
You must like using what I refer to as form punctuation. Please realize the site is not quite up to its precrash capabilities yet. It IS being worked on .I also have had problems with writing with one form and then the posted version turning "standard". This will be remedied in time. As to double spacing, have you considered how much easier this makes reading for sight impaired members? In any event welcome here and look forward to your contributions................scribbler
Marie Marshall
Sun, 2011-04-10 17:02
Hi Scribbler
I'm sorry but your point about sight impaired readers is a bit too much like emotional blackmail for me to pay it much serious attention.
First and foremost a poem should be how a poet wants to present it. I certainly wouldn't mind if an individual with sight problems then told me frankly that he or she couldn't read it, and I would gladly do another version for them.
The more I look at it, the more I become convinced that this is not the site for me, if this is the sort of attitude I am going to meet.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentscribbler
Sun, 2011-04-10 17:46
hello
I by no means intended any type blackmail. By double spaced do you mean spaced as in these comments? I HAVE had a few readers comment as to a particular form of poetry being hard for them to read but did not intend you take it as a rebuff of your concerns as I share them myself. I write mainly in metered rhyme but in the free verse i Do write I prefer to use form to punctuate the words. If I have inadvertently offended you I apologize............scribbler
Marie Marshall
Mon, 2011-04-11 02:14
No worries, scribbler.
No worries, scribbler.
No, I meant that when I pasted in text that had a single line break the system inserted an extra line break.
I have found that if one types the poem in rather than copy/paste from an existing document this problem does not occur; however that's a wee bit tedious.
I'm testing this site to see how it compares with another site on which I have been posting poetry since 2006. On that site, although there is a great choice in 'off-the-peg' backgrounds and a savvy person can create her own, I use black font on white background; I can arrange it so that only the title and the text of the poem are visible on the screen by inserting spaces before and after the poem (which I can't here); I can set the poem in - say - Book Antiqua 12pt which is quite a visible font and which gives a comparable effect to the Perpetua 14pt which I use for my printed poetry (and which, by the way, is great for people with sight problems); also the last poem I posted there got read by forty people. I'm trying to give Neopoet 'a fair crack of the whip', because it was recommended to me as somewhere where people took their poetry seriously. So far, I have to say, it's struggling to measure up, but it's early days and the site is still being developed.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentscribbler
Thu, 2011-04-14 20:34
hello
I know it is frustrating to not be able to post in the form you would like. The old site, before it crashed, allowed almost infinite variations. To the extent that it allowed me to develop a "parallel" form of poetry which I can't duplicate here..........yet. I am no computer whiz, so I can hardly imagine the amount of work it is taking to bring this incarnation of Neopoet back to previous standards. In the mean time I hope you will post in standard form which is available and find the patience to live through the short term problems here. Heck, I get comments on my few free verse writes even without form punctuation lol............scribbler PS Old site also tracked number of hits (reads) also which is another thing not yet implemented here, but which will be
andrew
Thu, 2011-04-14 21:09
Try now
We've made a big upgrade
(see: http://new.neopoet.com/node/progress-0)
scribbler
Thu, 2011-04-14 22:23
good news
I'll give it a shot with my next free verse...........stan
Marie Marshall
Fri, 2011-04-15 05:30
I hear you.
Okay, I'll continue to observe and see what I can do. I can't stress enough, however, that the way my work looks is integral to the work, part of how I convey the message, and therefore is not something that can easily be dispensed with in favour of a 'standard form'. I do work almost exclusively in black font upon white paper/screen, the words being the most important element; BUT there is significance in, say, how I use italics, what font I use (normally that is 'Perpetua' 14pt or 12pt, that font having a symbolic significance for me), the length of lines, the overall shape on the page. I can live without the font - just about - but the more I have to alter my work the further it strays from what I intend it to be. I know I will never be able to present an example of my 'Lithopoesis' ( http://lithopoesis.webs.com ) here, because it depends on the creation of columns of justified text to give a particular visual effect which is essential to the expression of the poem.
To take this to a logical extreme it would be like asking Van Gogh to paint only in black and white, or Mozart to write only for the cello.
Anyhow, I'm sorry to be difficult, but I would rather make my point than stay silent on the matter. The latter would be dishonest.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentscribbler
Sat, 2011-04-16 11:42
Hi
apparently they have fixed the indentation problem. If so, I'll post a few of my rare free verse poems from old site to illustrate how I also make a lot of use in form variation. I even prefer posting my rhyming work in a non-standard manner. I think I'll try "The Hunter" today and if it posts correctly I'll PM you with the instructions.If a near computer illiterate like myself can do it, it won't be very difficult................stan
Marie Marshall
Sat, 2011-04-16 12:00
Okay Stan...
... I'll wait to hear from you. Thanks.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentandrew
Sun, 2011-04-10 17:05
Sight impairment
Have you tried the text style or page style features? You can increase the size of the font, or even change the contrast.
Marie Marshall
Sun, 2011-04-10 17:16
page style etc.
No, not tried anything yet. I thought all that was available was plain text or a rudimentary rich text (the latter being the one which cut up my lines).
It really would be good if we could simply cut and paste from an original document, even if the site converted it into a standard font etc.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentandrew
Thu, 2011-04-14 21:10
Try again
We're doing formatting in a whole new way.
...we even allow indents (I know ... I know ...)
Marie Marshall
Fri, 2011-04-15 05:22
Hi Jim
I'll check it out. I'm going to try again with a new poem and see how I get on.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentRace_9togo
Thu, 2011-04-14 23:33
Hi Marie
http://new.neopoet.com/node/progress-0#comment-30309
This explains it a little.
Respectfully, Race
"Laws and Rules don't kill freedom: narrow-minded intolerance does" - Race-9togo
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/Race_9togo
Marie Marshall
Fri, 2011-04-15 05:21
Hi Jim
I'll check it out.
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentMarie Marshall
Mon, 2011-04-11 02:21
reply 2
I have had a wee tinker.
Does altering the page style and font size:
1] alter how a single page looks to me,
2] alter how a single page looks to other readers, or
3] alter how the whole site looks to me?
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
author commentandrew
Thu, 2011-04-14 19:52
If you mean the tools on the side of the page
Just changes it for you. It's the whole site (settings should "follow you" if you are logged in)
magics02
Fri, 2011-04-15 00:01
Jumping in here Marie
First of all hello and I know what you are saying here but by all means the site like others have stated here is not all functioning and we are all working within its perimeters so please be patient and know that Andrew and the others are giving you good directions. Hope to read more of your poetry either way it is formatted the message is more important then anything. Welcome aboard and hope you are getting it all figured out by now. Just wanted to share that with you
Regards
Mona (Magics)
Marie Marshall
Fri, 2011-04-15 05:20
Feel free to jump in. :)
Hi Mona - just sending you a private message.
Despite what anyone may say, in the way *I* present my art the formatting is an integral part of the whole work, and therefore an integral part of delivering the message.
M
___________
Nah pop no style, a strickly roots.
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