WYSIWYG editor from hell

(Evan Wills) #1

I am copying pages that didn't make it across from our old to our new site.


I am copying perfectly good clean standards complient HTML 4.01 and XHTML code.



As I often edit the raw code so it's marked up using white space to indent.

When I dump this good code into MySource Matrix, the WYSIWYG editor converts the white space into HTML non-breaking spaces ( ) and puts line breaks between paragraphs where I've put white space to make reading the code easier.



This only happens when I use indenting.



I have a large number of pages that I have to copy from one site to the other. Is there a way of stopping the from hardcoding the white space. It's increasing my copy time by about tripple.

(Avi Miller) #2

Set the default bodycopy type to Raw HTML instead of the WYSIWYG editor. :slight_smile: You can do this from the System Configuration screens (if you have root access) or ask your System Administrator to do it for you.

(Evan Wills) #3

[quote]Set the default bodycopy type to Raw HTML instead of the WYSIWYG editor. :slight_smile: You can do this from the System Configuration screens (if you have root access) or ask your System Administrator to do it for you.[right][post=“12983”]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]What will happen when the WYSIWYG editor is turned back on?


I’m the only one copying/editing/creating content now but when the site is live, others will be editing it using the backend so the WYSIWYG editor will have to be turned back on at some time.



PS: Thanks for the speedy reply.

(Ben Caldwell) #4

What version of Matrix are you using? It's odd that the WYSIWYG Editor would be converting spaces into non-breaking spaces (&nbsp;) when entering text in the 'view source' mode.


As Avi said, using the Raw HTML Content Type will make your task much easier, as no modification of your input would occur at all.

(Avi Miller) #5

I believe its the browser doing it, actually. I've particularly noticed this when pasting from Dreamweaver into the WYSIWYG Editor. However, once you switch back to the WYSIWYG Editor (if you're in Raw HTML to start with), it should keep the proper HTML in place.


Usually these kinds of things are a result of bad behaviour of Windows during a cut'n'paste operation. Windows tries to be "clever" too often.

(Adendle) #6

We have noticed this bug in the last few days. Noone in the dev team has updated any browsers. The only change we made was to go from Matrix 3.10.1 to 3.10.3. This error occurs consistently across Firefox, IE6 and IE7…


Any ideas as this may have some disasterous affects with our deployment of the Simple Edit Interface.

(Ben Caldwell) #7

I've only been able to partially reproduce this problem. Please make sure you clear your browser cache if you have upgraded to 3.10.3 from an older version (if you don't, the browser will use the old cached copy of the WYSIWYG javascript). If the problem persists, please log a bug report so that it can be lnvestigated further :slight_smile:

(Adendle) #8

The problem is that the first time the WYSIWYG is used the content is entered fine and can be saved.


When you try to edit the content again it is all like this:



%3Cp%3Efdjakflds%20fdjkalsf%3Bds%20jfkdlsa%3C%2Fp%3E%3Cp%3E%5C%20%3C%2Fp%3E



The page still renders fine to the public user, but no good to editor???



Any thoughts…i did flush my cache with no change…



I can say that this error is happening to 2 users and a third does not get this problem at all.

(Adendle) #9

If I change the content-type for the DIV to "WYSIWYG" then the top of the editor goes blue and I can edit as expected. If I leave it as "un-changed" then I get the additional chars appearing…


HELP!!!

(John) #10

I have the same problem in Firefox as well so it's not browser related and the &nbsp; problem is there no matter whether you construct the indenting in HTML view by hand or paste it in–it makes no difference. At first I thought that maybe the DB needed some mechanism to determine the structure and was opting for &nbsp; as this determinant. However, I now realise that the RAW HTML mode doesn't have a problem with storing human readable HTML structured formatting. So, this can only mean that the information is being modified before it hits stored in the DB. Is there any possiblity that it has something to do with the HTML Tidy settings? I haven't checked this myself though.

(Vsterling) #11

We do not use HTML Tidy and I noticed we are getting the same error from our WYSIWIG after upgrading to 3.10.2. It seems to happen when you try and use the Toggle HTML source button to paste in HTML. Everything looks fine until you commit then it turns to junk.


My solution was to not do that (raw html mode instead)… but then again its just two of us that work in MSM. We haven't released any simple edit to our users yet. Lucky us. <_<

(John) #12

[quote]My solution was to not do that (raw html mode instead)… but then again its just two of us that work in MSM.  We haven’t released any simple edit to our users yet.  Lucky us.  <_<
[right][post=“13033”]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]

I’ve found a workaround for this issue. It’s a FireFox only extension called Xinha (pronounced zena) based on htmlArea which has one very nifty feature for those of us who need to work in code view on occasion. Xinha will take your munged WYSIWYG HTML code and re-format it into human readable HTML format i.e. tag indenting etc. Not earth shattering I know but jolly handy when you have to fix something in code view.



Another nifty feature of Xinha albeit in WYSIWYG mode only at present is the free text Find and Replace tool as well as the life-saving Paste as Plain Text plugin



You could even use it as a replacement editor site-wide assuming you could do without the other custom Matrix integration features and were doing all of your editing from FireFox browsers with the Xinha extension installed that is.

(Ben Caldwell) #13

Avi is correct. Since the WYSIWYG Content Type makes use of the browsers 'Editable Region' component, I can confirm that it is the browser doing this.


I'm investigating further…

(Ben Caldwell) #14

There doesn't appear to be anything we can do to prevent this (apart from write a custom editable region component from scratch). I've detected it in versions as early as 3.8.2 (and I suspect it has always been a flaw of the HTML Source Plugin).


I recommend you use the Raw HTML Content Type to paste your indented HTML into and then change to the WYSIWYG Content Type. Once the content is submitted using the WYSIWYG Editor any pretty HTML code will be re-arranged into whatever format the browser likes anyway.