Edit Wording and Phrases: HTML Basics

As ConfTool administrator, you can change all wordings of the system via the web-based configuration. For many textual parameters you can also enter "HTML code" if you require text formatting or links to resources outside of ConfTool.

The two computer languages used to create Web pages and to format text in ConfTool are called "HTML" and "CSS". You find many excellent manuals on HTML and CSS on the Web. As these manuals are mostly very extensive, we provide some basic hints for the languages below:

The most important commands in the context of ConfTool are:

  • To format text in <b>bold</b> use the command "<b>" or "<strong>". Please note that most elements come in pairs, an “opening tag” (<b>) and a “closing tag” (</b>), denoted by the leading slash.
  • For text in italics, please use "<i>" and "</i>" or "<em>" and "</em>".
  • Underlined text can also be used, although it is usually not recommended because it can cause readability problems (e.g., line might interfere with lowercase letters g, j, p, q and y). The corresponding tags are "<u>" and "</u>".
  • You can create headlines in four different sizes using the following tags:
    <h1>Headline 1</h1>, <h2>Headline 2</h2>, <h3>Headline 3</h3>, <h4>Headline 4</h4>.
  • For colored text, you have to use "CSS commands". There are also CSS commands for the above text styles, but as you will see, CSS code is more sophisticated. To define colored text, you need to use the <span> command with the "attribute" style. The style definition contains the CSS-Code, and it looks like this:
    <span style="color: red;">text in red</span>.
  • If you want to link to documents outside of ConfTool (for instance to your template for paper submissions), please use the "<a>" element with the following attributes:
    <a target="_blank" href="http://example.com/file.pdf"> ...this is the link text... </a>
    The target attribute is strongly recommended in ConfTool for external links to open the link target in a new window or tab.

If you need further assistance with HTML coding, we suggest utilizing an online HTML converter. Tools that can reliably convert text into HTML code are for example the “HTML-Online Editor” or the “HTML5-Editor”. Use the visual editor on the one side to generate your HTML code on the other side. 

There may be instances where you need to insert a table in ConfTool, e.g. if you want to show information side by side / in two or more columns. For that purpose, we recommend an HTML table converter like “TableConvert”.

Please note that your “HTML code” has to be correct and syntactical valid, or you may mess up parts of the user interface of the system or even make them invisible. So if you do not feel confident with this, better do not use these codes.

In any case: Please test your updates and also check how the updated pages appear for normal users and if these changes will not corrupt the meaning of individual features!

Feedback is welcome!