What am I talking about you ask yourself? Simply this. Newbie authors tend to tap the 'Enter' key when they get to the end of a line. It seems to be a hold-over from the days of typewriters. Remember them? You had to hit the carriage return key on electric typewriters, or physically push the carriage control bar on manual typewriters, to raise the paper and reset the platen back to start printing the new line.

With computers and word processing software, this requirement is gone. Text automatically 'word wraps' at the end if a line, without any action required of the author. When you hit the 'Enter' key on your computer, you are actually inserting an end-of-paragraph format code into the document. You can't see it normally, but it's definitely there. Most word processors provide a way to see the 'hidden' formatting codes. With MS Word, my choice in word processors, there's a character on one of the 'tool bar' lines at the top of the screen that allow you to turn the feature on and off. The symbol on the button looks like a backward capital letter 'P' with a second vertical line (¶). This is a standard 'new paragraph' symbol used for many years by printing editors. When you turn the feature on, you see all the 'invisible' formatting codes in the document.

A story may look okay on your computer, but when it's converted to HTML so that it can be

read on the internet, the end-of-paragraph mark makes the computer insert a blank line

between paragraphs. If you have one on every line, it makes the story look like it's double

spaced. Just like you see with this paragraph.

Another problem is that computer users set different default fonts on their browsers. If you use a font that permits more or less characters per line than the font selected by the reader, then there is an 'overflow' or 'underflow' of characters. The above paragraph could look like this :

A story may look okay on your computer, but when it's converted to HTML so that it can be read on the internet,

the end-of-paragraph mark makes the computer insert a blank line between paragraphs. If you have one on every

line, it makes the story look like it's double spaced. Just like you see with this paragraph.

or this : 

A story may look okay on your computer, but when

it's converted to HTML so that it can be read on the

internet, the end-of-paragraph mark makes the

computer insert a blank line between paragraphs. If

you have one on every line, it makes the story look

like it's double spaced. Just like you see with this

paragraph.

In addition to newbie authors using the end-of-paragraph code accidentally, there are some experienced authors who use the code to 'force' a certain look to their stories, but the variety of browsers employed on the internet often negates the effect. There is an incredible difference between the two main browsers, Internet Explorer and Netscape. For example, some websites, designed to work best with IE, are almost impossible to view with Netscape.

To get rid of the unwanted end-of-paragraph codes, I first convert the file to a text file WITHOUT line breaks. This is successful about fifty percent of the time. The other fifty percent can only be cleaned up by using Microsoft Word's FORMAT command and that causes all kinds of additional problems. It sometimes totally destroys an author's formatting as it rearranges things the way that Microsoft thinks that they should be. But I don't always have a choice, as it's sometimes the only way to get rid of the erroreous codes on a wholesale basis. Also, I still have to go through the story because FORMAT sometimes has trouble recognizing where paragraphs should begin and end. So, I have to go through the story trying to spot disjointed paragraphs, in an effort to reconstruct them. If you ever read a story that doesn't read quite right, it was probably submitted with an end-of-paragraph mark on every line. FORMAT doesn't remove or add words, it just splits up paragraphs, and very often, sentences.    

Fortunately, only about two percent of the submissions have this problem, but it takes ten times as much effort to prepare these stories for posting, as it does for properly submitted stories.

This problem wastes almost as much of my time as the above problem. It is certainly more widely used. At least fifty percent of the stories that I receive have an extra end-of-paragraph code between paragraphs, but these stories only take twice as much time to post as a properly submitted story.

If you use MS Word, and want a blank line between paragraphs, use the PARAGRAPH option to set the distance to SIMULATE a blank line. When a story containing extra blank paragraphs is converted into HTML by my page formatting software (FrontPage98), the paragraphs look like they're separated by three or four blank lines, just like this paragraph.

To set the PARAGRAPH option in MS Word, click on the FORMAT tab, then click on the Paragraph option on the roll-down menu list. A window opens up with the option settings. In the Spacing - After box, click on the up arrow until it reads 6 pt. That's all there is to it. When you reach the end of the paragraph and press the enter key (once), the word processor will leave extra space that simulates a blank line.

I used to go through the entire story, manually removing the blank paragraphs before I posted it, but it takes forever in a long story. Now, after loading the story into my word processor, I re-save the story as an HTML file. This strips out the extra paragraphs most of the time. Then, after it's converted, I re-save it as a WORD file. I then go to my hard drive and delete the interim HTML file. It requires extra time that I could use better elsewhere, but if authors won't do it before sending me the story, I have no choice.

Please report any problems to Crystal