I hate computers, etc.
January 16, 2010 8:59 AM Subscribe
How can I fix weird HTML to copy it into a text document?
My Mac is full of problems, but the most annoying one is the extra spacing that seems to come along with copying text from a website. The text still looks like part of it is single spaced, part is double spaced, etc.
I've tried opening it in Bean, NeoOffice, and TextEdit, and changing the settings to "single-spacing" in each (the only thing I know to do), but nothing is working here. For what it's worth, this is the website that's causing me problems. Today's problem, that is.
—Also, how can I mass-remove links? Currently, I have to click on each one and go to "Edit Link" and remove the URL.
—Is there anything better than NeoOffice? It tends to open documents with more intuitive formatting sense than Bean, otherwise I hate it.
I also need columns to set up this index I'm trying to make (see link above), which I would like to keep on one page, but that isn't going well either. I kind of just want Word 98 again when everything was simple and easy.
My Mac is full of problems, but the most annoying one is the extra spacing that seems to come along with copying text from a website. The text still looks like part of it is single spaced, part is double spaced, etc.
I've tried opening it in Bean, NeoOffice, and TextEdit, and changing the settings to "single-spacing" in each (the only thing I know to do), but nothing is working here. For what it's worth, this is the website that's causing me problems. Today's problem, that is.
—Also, how can I mass-remove links? Currently, I have to click on each one and go to "Edit Link" and remove the URL.
—Is there anything better than NeoOffice? It tends to open documents with more intuitive formatting sense than Bean, otherwise I hate it.
I also need columns to set up this index I'm trying to make (see link above), which I would like to keep on one page, but that isn't going well either. I kind of just want Word 98 again when everything was simple and easy.
Shift+Control+Option+Command and the V key (as opposed to just Command+V) pastes text without carrying over any formatting. Don't know if it works with NeoOffice.
posted by qwip at 9:18 AM on January 16, 2010
posted by qwip at 9:18 AM on January 16, 2010
Ah, good call qwip, but the command is Shift+Option+Command+V, no Control.
posted by Mr. Anthropomorphism at 9:24 AM on January 16, 2010
posted by Mr. Anthropomorphism at 9:24 AM on January 16, 2010
Response by poster: For some reason, all those commands make the "you can't do that!" sound, otherwise they would be amazing alternatives.
posted by lhude sing cuccu at 9:40 AM on January 16, 2010
posted by lhude sing cuccu at 9:40 AM on January 16, 2010
Are you using Firefox? If so, try the Copy Plain Text extension.
posted by ocherdraco at 9:51 AM on January 16, 2010
posted by ocherdraco at 9:51 AM on January 16, 2010
HTML ignores most whitespace (with rare exceptions I won’t get into). Hence the source could use a lot of blank lines and you wouldn’t know till you pasted to a place where they become visible.
How much text do you need to copy and how often?
BBEdit can remove linebreaks and markup in one fell swoop each.
posted by joeclark at 10:12 AM on January 16, 2010
How much text do you need to copy and how often?
BBEdit can remove linebreaks and markup in one fell swoop each.
posted by joeclark at 10:12 AM on January 16, 2010
If any of the editors you've got can do search and replace on carriage returns / paragraph marks, you could replace two carriage returns with a single one and run that several times to eliminate all of the double spacing.
posted by XMLicious at 11:08 AM on January 16, 2010
posted by XMLicious at 11:08 AM on January 16, 2010
Best answer: If you really just want to convert to plain text, Mr. Anthropomorphism's solution should be perfect. Are you sure you're running the command from within TextEdit and not your browser, and that you're pressing Command (⌘) and not Control? You can also use the menu: Format → Make Plain Text. You can even go to Format → Text → Spacing to just change the spacing, but that's a real pain.
posted by serathen at 11:10 AM on January 16, 2010
posted by serathen at 11:10 AM on January 16, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Mr. Anthropomorphism at 9:14 AM on January 16, 2010 [3 favorites]