[WEB4LIB] Re: hanging indents?

[Peter C. Gorman]

At 5:25 PM -0800 3/15/01, Lee Jaffe wrote:
>>   Is there any way to create a hanging indent on a web page?
>
>Am I missing something or doesn't  <dl><dt><dd> answer this need?

Only if you're actually creating a definition list, in which case 
browsers' default rendering may do this. But, to quote from the Web 
Content Accessibility Guidelines, 3.1:

"Using markup improperly -- not according to specification -- hinders 
accessibility. Misusing markup for a presentation effect (e.g., using 
a table for layout or a header to change the font size) makes it 
difficult for users with specialized software to understand the 
organization of the page or to navigate through it."

If it's just the formatting effect you're after, CSS is really the 
only way to go. The combination of negative indent and postive left 
margin mentioned in a previous post works quite well, even in 
Netscape:

p.list { margin-left: +1.75em;
          text-indent: -1.75em  }

-- 
_______________________________
Peter C. Gorman
Senior Technology Librarian
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Library Technology Group
pgorman at library.wisc.edu
(608) 265-5291

What's the difference between fiddle players and government bonds?
Government bonds eventually mature and earn money.