Many people will create information for their website using Microsoft (MS) Word, offline, then cut and paste the information they made, into their webpage editor. The problem with using this method of page creation is MS Word adds all kinds of formatting markup to the text, to attempt to recreate the text look, on the webspage.

Take the following example:

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Example

This is a simple document created in Microsoft Word.

The purpose is to show how much extra information Word adds to the text when you use copy and paste into your web-page. This problem is magnified if you only take a part of the text, as some information is left behind which can really mess up your web-page, in unexpected ways.

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This is what your webpage needs to generate the page:

<h3>Example</h3>

<p>This is a simple document created in Microsoft Word.</p>

<p>The purpose is to show how much extra information Word adds to the text when you use copy and paste into your web-page. This problem is <strong>magnified</strong> if you only take a part of the text, as some information is left behind which can really mess up your web-page, in unexpected ways.</p>

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If you cut and paste the text from word, into your webpage, the output will look similar, however this is what MS Word uploads to the page: <p>Normal 0   false false false        MicrosoftInternetExplorer4       <br /><br /></p>
<p><strong><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Example</span></strong></p>
<br />
<p>This is a simple document created in Microsoft Word.</p>
<br />
<p>The purpose is to show how much extra information Word adds to the text when you use copy and paste into your web-page. This problem is <strong>magnified</strong> if you only take a part of the text, as some information is left behind which can really mess up your web-page, in unexpected ways.</p>

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The purpose is to show how much extra information Word adds to the text when you use copy and paste into your web-page. This problem is magnified if you only take a part of the text, as some information is left behind which can really mess up your web-page, in unexpected ways.

As you can see, the additional formating really adds a lot to the page, and if any of it is not transfered correctly, problems arise.

The solution options are:

1. create the information online using your CMS's editor or
2. paste the MS Word content into your CMS's editor in html mode, then reformat it or
3. if your CMS's editor provides a function to paste from Word or includes a way to remove formating, this will reduce some of the bulk.

Option 1 is probably the best, as it eliminates the potential for generating garbage in your content.

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