But behind that formatted view, every post is actually written in HTML, ie Hyper-text Markup Language - a type of computer language that uses tags like <h2> or <a href="www.foo.com"> to say how to display the contents.
A number of how-to articles tell you how to do thing by changing the HTML for the post. But if you are not used to working with HTML, it can be confusing trying to find and fix the part that you need to change.
Marker-text is a technique that you can use to "mark" problem areas while you are still in Compose mode, so that you can easily find them again when you are in HTML mode.
How to use marker-text to fix a problem in your post
Start to prepare or edit your post in the usual way.Go to the place just before the problem you want to fix or change you want to make.
Add some extra blank lines.
In the middle of the extra blank lines, put a few characters or a word that do not occur anywhere else in your post. I quite often use XXX - but you can use any letters, characters or numbers, for example PROBLEM JUST AFTER HERE or 12345.
Use the copy function to put the text you added (without the blank lines) into your computer's memory.
Optional: Go to the place just after the problem you want to fix or change you want to make, and add some more text eg PUT IT BEFORE HERE
Switch to editing the HTM.
Find the marker-text:
- If you are using Blogger-2020 - see working with HTML in the new Post Editor
- If you are using legacy-Blogger, start the "find" feature in your web browser (use ctrl / f in Chrome or ctrl / f in Internet Explorer), and in the search box that opens, enter the exact marker text that you entered into the Find box, and press enter.
The post-edit window will go to the place where your marker text is. And in legacy-Blogger it will most likely be highlighted.
You have now found the place where you need to work, so you can now make the HTML changes required.
Once you have fixed all the issues, switch back to Compose mode using the tab in the top left hand corner, and remove all the marker text and extra blank lines that you added.
Good Practice
You will be removing the marker text before you publish your post.But just in case you accidentally click Publish before you mean to, only use text that would not be embarrassing if some of your readers accidentally see it.
Some RSS readers will see the contents of your post as they are when you first hit Publish, even if you edit them less than two minutes later.)
Leaving your Marker Text in Place
If you might need to find the same place in your post's HTML again, then instead of removing your marker-text, you may just want to comment it out.To do this, put these characters before it:
<!--
and these characters after it
-->
So it might look like this
<!-- START OF PROBLEM1 HERE -->
Make sure you get the spaces - highlighed in yellow as well as both of the "-- characters.
If you do this, then you will not be able to see or find your Marker Text when you are in Compose Mode, but you will be able to see and find it when you are in Edit HTML mode.
