Illinois Compass 2g, Text in Illinois Compass 2g

By default, Illinois Compass 2g will format text to 12-point, left-justified Arial. Any other formatting must be done with HTML tags or using the text editor.

Text boxes may appear using the text editor or with the options shown below.

Text box options

Smart Text, Plain text, or HTML may be used in the text editor. Options at the bottom of the box allow the user to switch format at anytime.
Smart text automatically recognizes a link entered in the text box. Smart text should be used if the intent is to display the text in the exact way that it is typed. Line breaks, tabbing, and other keyboard formatting will be retained with Smart text. Smart text recognizes the ENTER key as a paragraph tag and accepts HTML tags as well. Smart Text will also prompt to load images if an image source tag appears. Web addresses entered as URLs are converted to links. The URL must begin with "http://" and there must be a space before the "http://" to distinguish it from the previous word. If an image tag, <IMG>, is entered in Smart Text, Blackboard Learn will automatically prompt you to upload the image.

Plain Text

Displays text as it is written in the text area. Plain text does not render HTML code. HTML code will appear as text. Plain text strips any formatting from the text, except for line breaks. The result is completely unformatted text. This may be useful if the user needs to do a lot of copy and pasting of the content, or if the intent is to display code information. For example, if the user wants to show how to write something in HTML, Plain text should be used to retain the HTML tags in the content. Plain text does not work with MathML or the equation editor. Changing a text box that includes a mathematical formula to Plain text will make the formula unreadable.

HTML

Displays text as coded by the user using Hypertext Mark-up Language (HTML) tags. The HTML option should be used if the user knows HTML and opts to type HTML tags into the Text Editor. The result will be content formatted by the HTML tags used.

Preview shows the user how the formatted text appears when rendered in the browser.

NOTE:  The Smart Text and Plain Text options are only available if the Administrator has turned off the Text Editor or if the user does not have a Windows Operating System and Internet Explorer Version 5.x or a later.

NOTE:  It is not possible to display a file in a content item and add a Smart Text or Plain Text description. Add the description as a separate content item and then add the file in the next content item.

Copying and pasting text to prevent loss

To protect against losing work if an Internet connection loss or software error occurs, you may choose to type in an offline simple text editor, such as Notepad, and copy and paste your work into Blackboard Learn. Copying and pasting from fully-featured word processing programs such as Microsoft Word may insert hidden formatting that can cause display issues. You can add the desired formatting after the text has been pasted into and saved in Blackboard Learn's text editor.

Alternately, you can select and copy all of the text typed in Blackboard Learn before submitting or saving. Use the mouse to select the text and then and right-click to copy the text, or press Ctrl+A to select all of the text and then press Ctrl+C to copy the text.

File names

Blackboard allows the use of all characters in file names. However, the user's operating system and browser may limit the types characters accepted. For example, some browsers do not accept Multi-byte characters.