InsaneJournal

For the magic apple!!!!
So, Abby asked me the other day - how do you make your font come out Arial on IJ? So I showed her, and then just decided to put up a great big resource code post so she'd always be able to come back to it. ^.^

Here, we're gonna start with the basics. All of the below edits will be done using HTML, as that's the best way to do anything to change appearance on IJ. An HTML tag is any code designed to change the appearance or functionality of whatever is between it and its close, and is always in the < and > signs. To end an HTML tag, you just put in a forward slash (/). Observe: < / tag > (To make the code work, you would do so without spacing.

So let's start with basic formatting now.

Bolded Text: <b>the text you want bolded</b>

Underlined Text: <u>the text you want underlined</u>

Italicized Text: <i>text you want italicized</i>

Strikethrough: <s>text you want a strikethrough for</s>

So those are fine and dandy on their own, but let's say you want them combined for some reason. Maybe you want bolded, italicized text. To accomplish this, you would combine the tags like so:
(EXAMPLE: Bold/Italics)
<b><i>text you want changed</b></i>

Make sense? Okay, good.

Now we'll move on to changing colors. You have two choices when it comes to coding your colors. You can use generic names, such as "red," "green," "blue," and "black." You are very limited in using generic names. Your second option is to use hex codes. You can find a VERY extensive list of hex codes here. Directions for changing the color your text will appear as have been included in the text boxes.

Generic Names (Red used in example) <font color=red>to change from red to another color, just take red out and put in the other color.</font color>

Hex Codes <font color=#691F01>to change from "691F01" to another color, replace the hex code with another. DO NOT REMOVE THE # SIGN.</font color>

Alright, let's try changing font now!

Font in Arial! <font face="Arial">to change from Arial to another font, remove "Arial" and replace it with another font. BE SURE TO PUT IT IN QUOTES.</font face>

Okay, now we're onto font size. This can be tricky. There are several ways to do this... but usually I just go with the +1/-1 method. Instead of worrying about SPECIFIC sizes, you're using a +1 or -1 tag to fix your font size. (Obviously, if you need it even smaller or larger, you can increase the number.) There is also the classic < small > tag. Conversely, the < big > tag is also usable. I have included examples of all of the above in the text boxes below.

Font minus 1 <font size=-1>the text you want to be smaller</font size>	Small tag <small>the text you want small</small>
Font plus 1 <font size=+1>the text you want larger</font size>	Big tag <big>what you want big</big>

Of course, there are other ways, and if you'd like, I can expound upon them. But for now, we'll just keep going. Now, we've covered changing font color, font face, and font size. Let's combine them - let's say you want a dark green color for your Arial font, which you want in -1 size. You will be able to combine these tags - but unlike before, you can end all of them with the SAME CLOSE TAG: < / font >. Why? Because font color, font face, and font size are all font adjustments, and closing an unspecified font tag will close ALL tags. So here we go.

Your special font, combined <font color=#003300><font face="Arial"><font size=-1>your text; obviously, you can remove one or more of those tags if you wish, and the font colors, faces, and sizes are interchangeable.</font>

So let's combine all this special font formatting in one go. This is, of course, just an example.

font that is very pretty <font color=red><font face="Arial"><font size=+1><b>font</b> <s>that</s> <i>is</i> very <u>pretty</u></font>

Let's do some IJ specific tags now, yeah? We'll cover user tags, comm tags, and cuts, w/ and w/o text.

honeydrop <lj user="honeydrop">

sugardrops <lj comm="sugardrops">

Lj-Cut Without Text <lj-cut>text you want cut</lj-cut>

Lj-Cut With Text <lj-cut text="teeeext">cut teeeeext</lj-cut>

links
- Table Coding, In Detail. This is an excellent resource for those looking to design tables.

More to come; this is the first saved draft. ^.^ happy coding!