Web Publishing
Using Word as a Web Publisher?
Microsoft Word supports the creation of web pages; however, there are some inherent problems with this process. This document includes information on the problems of using Word as a web publisher.
Disadvantages of Using Word as a Web Publisher
Word offers the option of saving a document as a web page. When you use the Save as... Web Page feature, in addition to bringing in a lot of extraneous code, it may also have the following implications:
- Increased file size and download time
- Excess coding (code bloat)
- Difficulty editing the document due to the excess code added to the page
- Some coding is supported only by Internet Explorer
- May result in duplicate image files
- Image filenames are generic (e.g., image1.gif; image2.gif)
- Changing web page filename can break the links to the images and other files
- Improper file and folder names (including spaces)
- No alternate text added for accessibility by those with visual problems
Example: a one-page syllabus in table format created in Word
| Source | File Size | Lines of Code |
| Word Document | 11k | n/a |
| Word: Save as Web | 25k | 536 |
| Word: Save as Filtered Web | 4k | 129 |
| Created in Dreamweaver | 2k | 41 |
Moving Content from Word to a Web Editor
When converting a Word document to HTML, we recommend that you transfer the content, but not the formatting. You can do this in one of two ways:
- Using copy and paste, paste the text from Word into Notepad. Copy the text from Notepad to your web editor. This option is a sure way to remove background code from Word.
- Using copy and paste, paste the text from Word into your web editor using a Paste as Text or Normal option if available. This option pastes the content only.
