Instructables Text Formatting

Step 10 Missing Features, Bugs, and Workarounds

Just for reference, this is the WikiFormatting stuff that doesn't work on Instructables.

• Numbered Lists
• Definition Lists
• Blockquotes
• Discussion Citations
• Tables
• Images (unless you use the "attach image" button)
• Comments
• Colors

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There are several known bugs (or weird features) with the Instructables formatting.

• As noted in Step 8, non-ASCII characters aren't handled quite right. Literal extended characters put into text (e.g., cut-and-pasted from Word) are published with extraneous nonsense characters. If you insert an entity and re-edit the text, it will be returned to you as a literal, with subsequent nonsense prepended.
• Square brackets used literally (i.e., not for a valid hyperlink) generate a red error box when published.
• Characters placed immediately before a hyperlink (square bracket) get shifted to the end of the link when published. This includes special formatting characters like apostrophes for bold or italic.



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There are "workarounds" for the last two problems listed above. The entity bug is pervasive and inescapable. Every time you edit a block of text with extended characters, you must go back through and replace them with the original entity strings.

• To avoid the literal square bracket problem, use the numeric entities ([and]) in your text.
• To make a hyperlink bold or italic, just leave a space between the formatting character and the leading square bracket:

     Here's a ''' [<URL> bold link]'''

_{^{& #91; - & #93;}}