Hertfordshire Wheelers

Editing Text

Editing text

WP has two editors; the Classic editor and the Block or Gutenburg editor. User accounts are set up to use the Classic editor as this will be most familiar – it is similar to the one that was used on the previous version of the website. The Block editor starts to be useful if you are constructing pages with complex layouts or wish to embed things like image galleries, videos etc.

Switching editors

Although you may not want to do this you may have to since WordPress saves the editor that was last used on a post or page and assumes you will want to use it too. To change from:

Classic → Block. Click Switch to block editor in the right-hand column.

Block → Classic. Click the three dots at the top right of the screen (next to Save). Click Switch to classic editor in the menu that appears.

Classic Editor

The range of formatting buttons available to you are deliberately restricted – you will not be able to set fonts or text colours for example. This ensures consistency of styles across the website.

Things to note:

If you can see only one row of buttons then click the right-most button. A second row will appear.
The styles, fonts etc. you see when editing will not look like those used on the website. Don’t worry! The correct styles will be applied once the page is saved and viewed.
You can cut and paste text from Word, Excel etc. When you paste you will have to use a keyboard shortcut – Ctrl+V on windows, Command (⌘)+V on Apple. The editor will “sanitise” your input by removing most of the formatting. Sometimes it’s best to use Ctrl+Shift+V (Windows), Option+Shift+Command+V (Apple). This just pastes the text without the formatting
To add a text link start by selecting the text you want to link then click the link button (the one that looks like a piece of chain). If you want to link to a page on our website start typing the page’s title then select the page when it appears. To link to an external page you have to type the full URL – https:// etc.
If you uploading a document you wish to link to then you can use the Add Media button. This will take you to a dialogue that let’s you upload the document to the media library and set attributes. Do set the Title (which is what will appear in your text), the Privacy(public or private) and the Category.
To add a table … Ah! unfortunately the classic editor doesn’t support this! This could probably be fixed. However, it’s likely that most tables will originate on Word or Excel (or equivalents) and these can be cut and pasted. Don’t bother with complex formatting, it will be sanitised away. Bold and italic text will survive though.
Adding images is a good thing, it makes pages and posts more attractive. If you are adding just one image it is usually best to make it the featured image. This will then be displayed at the top of the page or post. Also, a miniature version will be displayed alongside the post in the news listing.
1. To add a featured image click Set featured image in the right -hand column.
2. To add an image in the text click the Add media button top-left of the edit screen and follow the dialogue. Don’t forget to set the attributes (Alt. Text, Privacy and Category)
In the right-hand column you should set the category of the post or page you are editing.
When adding an image, featured or not, you are taken to the media library. Once the image is inserted into the text you can click on it to make adjustments:
- Set the alignment: left, right, centre.
- After clicking the pencil icon:
  - Add/edit alternative text and caption.
  - Change the size of image.
  - Add a link to the image. It is a good idea to set this to Media File. This will mean that when a user clicks on the image a full-size version will appear.
Finally, in the right-hand column click on Update or Publish to save the changes you have made. You should now see “View Page/Post” in the admin bar. Click this to see the results of your efforts.

Block Editor