Have you ever had Visual Editor disappear in your WordPress (WP) blog? When you’re editing or adding posts or pages if Visual Editor is available you will see two tabs above the box where you type your posts. One is Visual and the other was originally HTML, but now says Text.
Many WP bloggers probably do not realize there is a setting to make the Visual tab disappear. This can happen when updating WordPress or when collaborating in a WordPress blog with someone who prefers to write html manually.
To turn the Visual Editor back on go to Users (in the left column when you are logged into your blog), click on Your Profile, look for Personal Options and uncheck the box that says Disable the visual editor when writing.
Visual Editor is what provides the options for formatting your posts automatically without knowing how to write html from scratch. The default only shows the first row of options in the Visual Editor.
To reveal or hide the second row click the last icon in the first row. The icon has three lines of dots on it and says Show/Hide Kitchen Sink (Alt+Shift+Z) when you point at it.
The second row contains a drop-down for adding header tags and additional options for formatting text including changing text colors, pasting tools, a remove formatting button, tools for adding media, custom characters, indent, outdent, undo, redo and help.
After you show the Kitchen Sink by clicking on the icon or using the keyboard shortcut Alt + Shift + Z you will see the second row (pictured in the image below):
Those who use word processing programs such as Microsoft Word or the free open source alternative Open Source Word Process I prefer from OpenSource.org will be familiar with most of those options.
Something very useful that you may not be aware of are the buttons for pasting as plain text, paste from Word, and remove formatting.
How to correctly paste from Word or other formatted text into WordPress
If you have ever tried to paste anything from Word directly into WordPress you already know that it can be a mess. It can take longer to clean up the formatting than it would take to write it completely over from scratch!
These little known tools clean up the formatting and allow you to paste content into your WordPress blog. If one option doesn’t work just the way you like try the other one. Most of the time one of these will be just what you needed to turn your Word documents into blog posts.
If the text is not what you want use the remove formatting button to remove the exiting formatting and preserve the content. Then format in WordPress as usual.
My readers may have noticed that I put some information in colorful boxed that stand out in my posts. Have you ever read a long post and said, “yes, that is what I need to do” and then spent far too long skimming the article trying to find the “how-to” among the explanation?
I put the “how-to” parts, specific instructions, or mark a section of a post for reference using these boxes. I do this to make it easy for someone to quickly find the part of each post they need to implement what I am writing about. If you look at what I put in the boxes in this post to see what I mean.
I bring that up in this post because it is a function of the visual editor that allows me to do this quickly and easily. I highlight the selected text and click on the double quote Blockquote icon (Alt+Shift+Q).
The default in the Thesis Theme I used was a gray text. I asked my WordPress Ninja Derek Semmler to edit the CSS for my blogs to make my BlockQuotes more prominent. He edited the text and box color to match the theme of each site.
You can see the Thesis default in our Personalized Gifts blog and compare that to how prominent and beautiful these matching quote boxes are in our Golf Blog.
For those who know how, unique boxes can be created using CSS styling. If you don’t you can get someone who does to add the code and then you paste it into the html of your posts. That is how the different colored boxes in ExecGiftsBlog and NoBogies posts are done.
VISUAL EDITOR DISAPPEARS
- Potential Fixes for Missing WordPress Editor
USING WORDPRESS VISUAL EDITOR
- Business Blogging (Ed Bejarana) How to Use the WordPress Visual Editor
- How to Blog at Blogging Teacher (Twitter) Writing Blog Posts Using the Visual Editor
- TysTips WordPress Tips Using the WordPress Visual Editor – Excellent source for newbie bloggers; covers how to write your very first blog post
- Official WordPress Support How to Use Visual Editor
- Blog Wranglers Professional Blog Migration Services How to Change WordPress Font Colors in Visual Editor
HOW TO INSTALL WORDPRESS
- Flame Scorpion (Twitter) How to Quick Install WordPress and Start Your Blog Right Away
Gail Gardner
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thanks for the tip..this is handy for future references.
Wonderful as always! Will be coming for more I learn a lot every day. Keep on the good work.
Hello D. More,
I approved your comment, partly because a search for it didn’t turn it up on any other sites, but mostly so I could offer some commenting tips.
It is agonizing trying to determine if a generic comment like yours is spam or someone who sincerely wants to communicate. Any comment that could fit in any post is VERY likely to be deleted by most bloggers.
Worse yet, many bloggers will click spam and your comments will instantly be either deleted or moved into spam where many bloggers will not take the time to find them.
growmap would love you to read ..Why Your Geographic Location IS a Niche
this is a very helpful post, I included this on my bookmark because i am making it as my guide and so that I can share it with my friends thanks
Thanks very much for your great website;this is the words that keeps me going through out the day. I have been searching around for this site after asked to visit them from a buddy and was thrilled when I was able to find it after searching for some time. Being a avid blogger, I’m dazzled to see others taking initivative and contributing to the community. I just wanted to comment to show my approval for your article as it’s very appleaing, and many writers do not get credit they deserve. I am sure I’ll drop by again and will spread the word to my friends.
luizamaria would love you to read ..How to choose snowboarding equipment
Eye-catching.. and that’s what i like about this blog.
Its nice and quite, no people leaving stupid comments or having bullshit discussions.
Very productive information about the wordpress.
This article has very, very useful information and detailed advices.
A hard copy is a must.
Thank you so much! Two second fix!
Thank you! Been having this problem and was totally baffled. Tried lots of “solutions” and none of them worked, until now…
.-= Jonathan@Personal Development´s last blog ..How to Choose a Tarot Deck: The Limelight Way =-.
I use wordpress for my website blog. I have not found that types of problem before. I think in wordpress, visual editor tab enables by default.
Here’s a question – not sure if anyone else has experienced this. On a few of my WP installations, there are no buttons to turn the editor on or off. I’ve checked the setting for the user, and it is supposed to be on. Has anybody had this problem?
Hey thanks for a good tutorial! This was at the back of my mind. After going through your post, my mind got refreshed. This post is of good use to bloggers both, veterans and inexperienced.
I have struggled a lot with the visual editor while posting articles for my personal blog. Thanks to your post, it is now easy and less time is consumed. This is actually resourceful for those who have just entered the field of blogging.This just made my day much brighter. Thanks a lot.
Hi Limo,
I know that post I linked to that describes how to use each function of the visual editor will be really useful to all the bloggers both new and experienced who never knew what they all did.
I may review it myself now and then as a reminder of what else is available. Your limo business could benefit from getting free local listings in major directories like Google Maps, Yahoo Local, Bing, SuperPages and many others. See the post featured in CommentLuv for details.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Free Business Listings in Local Search Directories =-.
Gail I forgot all about that setting. Once I read your post it all came flooding back.
I usually use the visual editor unless I’m adding code and then I’ll switch to the html editor or the codes fail to work.
I usually use the blockquote feature for quoting other people, and I’m pretty sure my them allows me to change the color from within the theme edit section.
.-= Sire´s last blog ..Win A Trip For Two To Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Mansion =-.
Hi Sire,
I forget until it disappears and then I can never remember where the setting is; hence this post. Since I love bullet points and numbered lists I have to fix code now and again but write in the visual editor.
I’m sure quoting other people was the original reason for that function. I just find it a fast way to highlight the most important points in a post so that my readers and I can quickly find the section we want to refer to after reading.
I’ll have to look and see if there are settings for that function in Thesis (or maybe one of my readers who uses it will share their knowledge with us). There are so many bloggers who use Thesis I wouldn’t be surprised if someone already knows.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Keyword Tags, MetaTags, Tags: How Many Are Best? =-.
Hi!
I enjoy reading this post. It’s really very helpful especially for someone like me that maintains an account in WordPress. Keep it up!
During my initial days of blogging, I was clueless about this entire thing. It took me a lot of time in the bargain. Gradually, I came to know about the visual user setting of Word Press. This is a good post. Awaiting more such useful information!
Welcome Gaye,
I’m glad you liked it. I hope you saw the Best of GrowMap page (linked from the bottom of each post) or scanned the categories in the right column to see what else you might find useful.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Keyword Tags, MetaTags, Tags: How Many Are Best? =-.
Great post! I didn’t know that visual could be turned off, not that I’d do that, but it’s good to know how to turn it back on (just in case). I haven’t tried the paste from word feature, but have had little problems with my postings. Really like the box idea.
.-= NancyCollins@OnlineInternetMarketingTraining´s last blog ..Online Marketing Business Opportunity – How Far Can Faith Take You? =-.
Hello Nancy,
Most people don’t realize that it can be turned off and on until it disappears either because of a conflict with a plugin or because someone else who has access to their blog turns it off and forgets to turn it back on or doesn’t realize they won’t know how.
That has happened to me a few times over the years so I decided to write this post so I will always know where to look and to assist others who run into the same issue.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Why Marketing is NOT Evil =-.
Just started to use WordPress so this will come in handy.
Thanks
Evelina
You’re welcome Evelina,
One thing that could really help you is to make friends with WordPress bloggers who leave chat open while they’re working. That way you can get quick answers as you need them. It is much faster to learn when you have direct connection to someone with experience.
If you want some great tips on taking your blog to the next level check out my Blogging Success post.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Who Can You Benefit by Sharing GrowMap? =-.
I actually prefer to turn it off because when you click the new post button it takes longer to load. I also have seen some odd ways it displays when I write posts in the visual editor and not based on code.
.-= Chris Guthrie@Make Money on the Internet´s last blog ..Proliferation of Misinformation =-.
Hello Chris,
No wysiwyg editor is perfect and they all have to be tweaked at times. Perhaps with lots of experience one could learn to proofread and rewrite in html but it gives me a headache. It would help if links went AFTER the anchor text in html instead of before.
I probably should write some posts on how to tweak common issues introduced by visual editor. I am always swamped so if anyone needs to know just send me an email through the contact form.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Keyword Tags, MetaTags, Tags: How Many Are Best? =-.
OK what nut-jobs manually HTML when they don’t have too??hehe
.-= Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..Attention comment contest winners – Don’t fret, your cash is comin’! =-.
Apparently there are a lot of code jockeys who prefer to write in html and disable WordPress Visual Editor.
I suspect they don’t read, rewrite and edit what they write as doing that in html view is no fun at all. To each their own.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..My Review of The New Community Rules =-.
I use Open Office; never heard of Open Source.
.-= Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..Will DEDC Comments Remain Do-Follow? It’s Up To YOU! =-.
Hi Dennis,
If you use Open Office you are using Open Source. There are different views on exactly what Open Source is especially since where it started is certainly not where it is currently going.
My definition means independent of multi-national corporate control. If we allow them to take over and control open source projects what really is the point?
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Why Marketing is NOT Evil =-.
Sorry, I meant I never heard of OpenSource.org.
“Open Source” simply means the source code is open to anyone wanting to work on the program…developers and such.
.-= Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..DEDC Remains DoFollow – BUT… =-.
Thanks- your post is timely! Some of us ‘nut-jobs’ have to update the HTML manually on the odd occasion…but only when clients post things in from word documents without cleaning up the code first!
Thank you Lisa, it warms my heart to know when someone reads my comments. LOL
You misinterpreted though. I said, “when they don’t have to” you clearly stated sometimes you have to…..hence, not a nut-job. 😉
.-= Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..Will DEDC Comments Remain Do-Follow? It’s Up To YOU! =-.
LOL. We can always count on Dennis to make the comments here more interesting. Lisa, you might send the link to the “how-to-use-Visual-editor” tutorials to your clients and make sure to point out the Paste from Word, Paste as Plain Text and Remove Formatting tools mentioned in this post.
Have you tried using Remove Formatting to clean up those code issues? I’d be interested in knowing how well it works and have no reason to test it myself.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Free Business Listings in Local Search Directories =-.
Not sure how helpful this will be, but when moving from Word to WP, I just pop it into a notepad sheet first.
This is why I stopped going from Word to WP a long time ago. lol
.-= Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..DEDC Remains DoFollow – BUT… =-.
I love your tip about inserting the boxes in your blog. I use thesis on a couple of my sites but no I’m not getting the best out of them. I’ll try your little trick although I don’t have a cluse with css that’s why I picked thesis initially.
Hi Richard,
I am going to suggest that Derek offer adding these boxes to WordPress blogs for a fee. My philosophy is why learn to do something that only needs doing once if your primary interest is writing or business.
What do you think? Would you want to have someone create some custom CSS to match your theme colors. I asked him to do three custom things to the CSS in this and our other blogs:
1) Improve the look of the quote function
2) Create custom divider lines to use in long posts
3) Add a blank line between header 4 sub-titles in a post and the text (the default is to start the text immediately after the title and I feel having a blank line is more readable
I don’t know anything about editing CSS and suspect there are many other bloggers who could pay a small amount to have these improvements done for them.
It doesn’t take Derek long so I suspect it would not cost much – definitely well south of $100 and maybe even less than $50 depending on exactly what a blogger wanted done or how complex their color scheme is.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Who Can You Benefit by Sharing GrowMap? =-.
Great tutorial here! I’ve been using WordPress for seven years and did not notice the visual user setting!
I use both views in my work, depending on what I’m doing and like being able to switch back and forth.
Thanks for the tips.
.-= Alison Moore Smith@Easy Blog Setup´s last blog ..WordPress Backup: A Two-Step Process =-.
Hello Alison,
I’m sure there are many who don’t realize there is a setting to turn Visual Editor on and off. It is primarily used by code jockeys who don’t use it. I also use both but primarily the Visual Editor. I tweak code but I have no desire to write it from scratch!
.-= growmap´s last blog ..KeywordLuv: How Using It Benefits Us All =-.
I like the visual editor, It doesn’t mean that I can’t do without it. But it is easy to use and saves a lot of time.
I was unaware of the word processor bit and i think this a great addition to the visual editor.
Thanks for the great post!
Welcome Gautam Hans,
I for one would never choose to do without the visual editor. I read, reread and rewrite all my blog posts and doing that in html gives me a headache. Perhaps those who write in html don’t do that as much?
The tools for pasting formatted text from Word or any other program are so important I’m going to take that section and turn it into a second post.
You may want to consider researching additional anchor text to use when commenting. See the KeywordLuv post I’ll feature in CommentLuv for why that is important.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..KeywordLuv: How Using It Benefits Us All =-.
Excellent advice for using WordPress.
When I first starting blogging I didn’t know about the Paste from Word function, so I spent a lot of time cleaning up all the extraneous characters that come over from Word.
The button next to Paste from Word allows you to paste text from websites and remove any formatting.
And thanks for the info about the colored boxes!
.-= John Soares@ Selling Information Products´s last blog ..Screw SEO =-.
Hi John,
You aren’t the only one who had to figure out how to get Word to paste correctly into WordPress. This would make a great topic for every WordPress blog as many bloggers are probably still manually reformatting what they paste.
You’ve reminded me that I meant to show how the quote boxes work in some of our other blogs. Derek matches them to the background and color scheme of each blog. I’ll add them into the main post shortly.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..KeywordLuv: How Using It Benefits Us All =-.
I’m always a week too late when I learn how to do something new from another blog. I was messing with this and it was all messy looking. I figured it out the hard way. I guess the law of attraction really does exist!
Welcome Anthony,
I’ve visited your blog lately and just shared your left lane for dumb people post. I know many will identify. Fortunately for me I don’t have the problem any more.
I used to believe there was a Law of Attraction and it worked; however, I now believe that we are divinely guided to do what is most important when it is most important and cross paths with whomever is most important – provided we are listening.
We are definitely on the same page. I hope you will read the post I’ve shared in CommentLuv in this reply.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Why Marketing is NOT Evil =-.
I actually linked to that post from my post “Support Small Businesses.” We are definitely on the same page and I recommend your blog to anyone I talk to about small businesses or blogging.
Thank you. I popped over to your blog hoping you were using Twitter by now. That is how we connect faster so I hope you’ll consider it. Have you seen my comprehensive post on priorities for small businesses? I’ll put it in CommentLuv in this reply.
growmap would love you to read ..Small Business Internet Marketing
Initially I too struggled a lot with the visual editor with my personal blog. But after few hours of research I found out that by myself. But its nice to have a pictorial representation so that all newbies can easily identify it without much time spent on searching. Noble effort from you buddy. Keep coming with more good things like this.
Hello Alex,
I suspect few WordPress bloggers have seen those excellent links that show what each button does and how to use it. I hope now they’ll go check them out. Using them can speed up and improve their blog posts.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..My Review of The New Community Rules =-.
I have struggled a lot with the visual editor while posting articles for my personal blog. Thanks to your post, it is now easy and less time is consumed. This is actually resourceful for those who have just entered the field of blogging.
Hi Samuel,
I suspect it will be useful even to those who have been blogging for a long time. I really do need to publish that other post for those who may not have read that far and don’t read the comments here because they read blogs in RSS readers.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Keyword Tags, MetaTags, Tags: How Many Are Best? =-.
I wasn’t aware that there is a setting that makes the visual tab disappear. I’ve tried to paste content from Word directly into WordPress and the formatting took a pretty long time. Thanks to your article, I now know the tools.
Hello Peter,
I suspect most of the bloggers who use WordPress do not know about that setting. The only reason I know is that my WordPress Ninja and Randy who blogs about Architectural Moldings and Specialty Woods for Good Millwork both prefer to write blog posts in html instead of using the editor.
Sometimes Derek turns off the editor to diagnose issues in one of our blogs and there is no way I’m writing blog posts in html! I do tweak html and figure out as needed but I don’t see any reason to write posts the hard way. (No offense intended to those for whom that is NOT the hard way.)
I wrote this post to raise awareness because the first time it disappeared I didn’t know what to think or how to get it back. If I hadn’t known Derek I could have been looking a LONG time.
I should probably publish another post with just the second half of this post about pasting from Word into WordPress. Many struggle with pasting formatted text into Word and might not read this post.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..Verifying What is Do Follow versus No Follow =-.
i have try that tools
and realy great so now i write an article in word first then i copy it into my wordpress blog
and it looks so nice
Hello Imonli,
It can be faster to write in Word IF you know how to paste into WordPress using those tools. That is especially true if you use a lot of links in your posts.
.-= growmap´s last blog ..My Review of The New Community Rules =-.