page doesn't appear correctly

[barblevy]

I am attempting to try out Snippetmaster before making a purchase decision. I have it installed correctly and am able to open pages for editing. However, the preview of my pages is not anything similar to how the pages should look. (The background color fills the entire page, the fonts are wrong, etc.) Here are some screenshots. Can anyone suggest a solution? Thanks.

[Jenkinhill]

This is what heppens when css styles are not assigned to elements/divs within the selected snippet. For example in your sample image there may be no element with a background colour defined so the page default (body) background colour will be used. Similary you may have <p> tags around the text in the snippet, but may not have assigned a font style for p in your css so a efault font will show.

In addition to correctly applying styles to your pages your page editor you can also enter over-ride styles in the tnyMCE editor css file, such as to make the editor background colour always be white.

[barblevy]

Thanks, but I'm not sure of the best way to proceed.

I have a template applied which is set up in Dreamweaver, with links to an external css file. Do I need to embed the CSS on each page in order to use Snippetmaster?

Can you point me to instructions on how to "over-ride styles in the tnyMCE editor css file"? In the meantime, I'll hunt around.

Thanks.

[Jenkinhill]

You need to ensure that the markup/box elements within your snippets have specific style applied - is the attached stylesheet is the "correct" way to do this. So if all your text is in <p> containers the make sure you apply font stles and background colour to p in your stylesheet. You may have to make specific style classes for snippets if necessary, such as create a suitable div style and enclose your snippet content in such a div (make sure the div is inside the snippet start/end tags). Also ensure that all elements opened in a snippet are also closed before the end of the snippet.

Applyng styles to the editor window is covered in http://www.snippetmaster.com/forums/index.php/topic,1234.0.html
and http://wiki.moxiecode.com/index.php/TinyMCE:Configuration/content_css

[barblevy]

Thanks again.

I got the background to be white, using .mceContentBody in my css file, so at least I can see the text. But the page still doesn't appear as WYSIWYG. I've attached another screen shot which has how a portion of the page should look, versus how it appears in Snippetmaster.

I still hesitate to buy the PRO version or recommend this for clients who want to edit their own pages, unless this is just a function of the LITE version. What do you think?

[Jenkinhill]

You would be advised not to include the menu in your snippet. That is the first thing that the "user" messes up! Use multiple snippets on pages so that the user has chunks to edit rather than most/all of the page.

You say the div width is wrong, but how is it set? As a percentage of another container not included in the snippet or an absolute width in px/em. There were no "strange characters" that I could see on the jpeg but maybe you have some incorrectly formed html entities or code? Most style issues with editors such as tinyMCE are related to how css is applied (or not)  to the elements in the editable section (snippet).

The main advantages with the Pro version are in the extra facilities, such as file uploads, being able to set the editor window width and tailor the editor toolbars to remove buttons that are not required and may be misused.  The core editor itself is the same.