Formatting in Series Descriptions

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Formatting in Series Descriptions

1quasar
Editado: Mar 5, 2021, 11:54 pm

So I've added an anthology to a Series and have been trying to use the series description field to list all the stories that are in the anthology.

Thing is when save it took my nice ordered list and squished it into a ugly block of text. I tried manually using some html tags but they don't seem to work. Is there a way to format the text in a Series description?

2spiphany
Mar 6, 2021, 1:23 am

Unless all the stories in the anthology belong to the series, please don't add anthologies to series.

The "book description" field on the work page is a good place to add the contents of an anthology (you do need to add html in this field).

3gilroy
Mar 6, 2021, 10:13 am

IF the stories are individually within Librarything, you can use the Work to Work relationship to create the links of stories to Anthology.

I'd also recommend putting the stories in the Disambiguation Notice, so when someone tries to combine like named anthologies, they don't merge incorrect ones.

As >2 spiphany: said, unless the whole anthology belongs to the series, it really shouldn't be added, nor should the story listing be put in the series description.

4Cynfelyn
Mar 3, 2022, 4:32 am

Ignoring the OP's reference to anthologies, their original question still stands:

Series descriptions are still being "squished it into a ugly block of text. I tried manually using some html tags but they don't seem to work. Is there a way to format the text in a Series description?"

Bump.

5gilroy
Mar 3, 2022, 7:04 am

>4 Cynfelyn: Uh, this isn't a bug. Bumping it does nothing really.

6Cynfelyn
Mar 3, 2022, 8:37 am

>5 gilroy: I'm not trying to report a bug. I'm trying to 'Talk about LibraryThing'.

Is there a way to format the text in a Series description?

7gilroy
Mar 3, 2022, 9:14 am

>6 Cynfelyn: It's plain text only. Per Tim. when the new feature was released.
To change that, I'd suggest entering a bug.

8Nevov
Mar 3, 2022, 10:19 am

If it is set up as plain text by choice I think Recommend Site Improvements would suit better than a bug report >7 gilroy: since it is currently working as intended.

Or, rather than an RSI >6 Cynfelyn:, if wanting to canvass opinion, you might prefer to abandon this thread (since the answer to the OP and your >6 is now provided as simply "no, there isn't a way"). The Series group would be a good place to search and/or post, in that regard.

9Keeline
Mar 3, 2022, 3:44 pm

I have this recollection that HTML was allowed in series descriptions before they were reworked. That could be a false memory.

I tried to use HTML tags like you can in this forum but they were stripped away when the description was saved.

It is possible to include UNICODE formatting in one of these descriptions. So if you needed italics or bold then it is possible to achieve that. I tried this in a short series called Harry Harding. You will see that the word career is bolded in the description.

If you want to apply this level of inline formatting, you can use the tools on YayText.com to type or paste in some text and copy the encoded version with the style desired.

This won't help for newlines or lists or paragraph blocks which are stripped away in the LT code.

James

10Nevov
Mar 3, 2022, 4:52 pm

>9 Keeline: Using alternate unicode characters for bold/italics can have consequences on accessibility (Narrator app in Windows when I tried it in that example, it just ignored and skipped past the unicode-bold). So there may be cause for caution in using that as a workaround.

11Nevov
Mar 3, 2022, 4:58 pm

>9 Keeline: I believe you are remembering correctly about old series, since the page was the same layout/style as we still have for Awards and Characters, which both do allow HTML.