Adding formatting to elements

You can add styling, which is a collection of formatting attributes, to the template elements to format your output documents.

Consider the outputs you plan to generate the document into as you design the template. Some elements and their formatting properties display might not display the same way across all output formats. As you work on your template, consult the Element properties reference by output format and preview the output periodically as you work.

Style options

  • Create styles in an external style sheet

    You can use styles that are not defined in the document template if they are provided in the stylesheet. You must type the name of the style in the Properties view for the element. When the output is generated, the style you defined is used. If a style with that name is not found, no style is applied to that element. See Style sheets.

  • Create styles in Rational Publishing Engine

    Create general styling for element types, such as headings or lists. Apply the name of the style to all elements of that type in the Properties view. If you need to change the formatting, you can change it one time for that style and all elements that use that style are updated. See Creating and applying a style.

  • Apply specific formatting properties to individual elements

    Select an element in the template content editor and enter properties for just that element in the Properties view. See Formatting individual template elements.

Style precedence

Styles are applied in the following order:
  1. Template style sheets, if any
  2. Template styles, if any
  3. The formatting properties you define for the template elements, if any
If you find that a style is not being applied as expected, it might be for one of the following reasons:
  • The styles set in the formatting properties might be causing the styles that are applied earlier to be reset.
  • The name of the style might already exist in the Rational Publishing Engine default style sheet. For example, the Title style already exists. The Title style in the default style sheet overrides a style you create and name Title.
Tip: Avoid using more than one of the three methods for applying styles in a template. You might get mixed results in the output and have difficulty troubleshooting. When you must apply additional styling to an element that uses a particular style, apply the customization to a child element.

For example, you might want to change the color of a single paragraph that uses a style. Apply the style to the paragraph element and change the color property for the text element that the paragraph contains.

Restriction: Table properties in styles are not supported.

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