I recently updated an old post, to add a link to a newly published post - and experienced panic.
Adding a link to an old post, Deleted / Locked Blogs Have Several Causes, I discovered an oddity which caused extreme heartburn for several hours. Maybe you have experienced this, also.
Editing my post, and adding a simple single sentence, with embedded link, at the end of the post, I refreshed the display (always test your changes - no matter how minor!), and watched as the paragraphing scrambled itself.
I added a single sentence to the end of an old post - and watched as paragraphs in the post became hopelessly scrambled.
See the missing "</li>" at the end of the first list element?
Look at how the list line spacing is screwy now.
<li><a href="#DMCA">DMCA Violation</a> looks for copyright and similar violations.
Just one missing tag. Long ago, I learned to always close every list element properly.
<li><a href="#DMCA">DMCA Violation</a> looks for copyright and similar violations.</li>
But my proper list syntax policy had apparently started after the post, in question, was published.
I spent the next 1/2 hour re paragraphing the post content, following the broken list - and re spacing the list itself.
And having saved my work, the list - and the paragraphs following the list - remained scrambled.
This is no good!
How can I hope to help people, using this post?
Observing that paragraphing above the broken list was fine, I looked at the list code, line by line.
Paragraphing above the list is OK!
Much to my relief, I found a missing "</li>" tag. Adding the missing tag, I re paragraphed the post content - and this time, my changes remained.
This is what I would want to see.
Even the list remains properly spaced, in post editor.
Be very careful, when editing lists, in post editor "HTML" mode. Lack of care can lead to unpleasant consequence.
When editing a #Blogger blog post, in HTML mode, be very careful to avoid dropping closing list element tags. One dropped tag affects formatting of list content after the missing tag - and paragraphing following the broken list, even with the list properly closed.
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A few times recently, we've had reports, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, of mysterious text, appearing in the middle of the posts.How do I remove unwanted text appearing in the middle of the page?
Frequently, all that we can see is a mass of text.
Occasionally, the mysterious text has been readable. Extracting key phrases from the text, we can some times locate the source of the mysterious text, in the post code.
Having located the mysterious text, we are no smarter than we were just previously, however.
The mysterious text. In this case, the text is simply unreadable.
In some cases, we've been able to read the text. A text search, in the source code for the page, might turn up this snippet of post HTML code.
<div id="stcpDiv" style="left: -1988px; position: absolute; top: -1999px;">
The project sees local artists joining forces with the University’s smart material researchers to work with local community groups to explore, create and design different applications for smart materials - See more at:
http://www.bolton.ac.uk/MediaCentre/Articles/2013/Feb2013-3.aspx#sthash.JEpPZWbT.dpuf</div>
stcpDiv
The key phrase in the code snippet appears to be the div id, "stcpDiv".
A Google search turns up a few discussions about the mysterious text. It appears that "stcpDiv" is part of a copy protection technique.STopCoPyDIV
Apparently, this allows source websites to publish content with metadata - the equivalent of a non visible watermark - linking back to the source, when content is copied to another website.
To resolve this, you have to edit the post which contains the "stcpdiv" code in Compose mode, and use the "Remove formatting" tool. Then reformat the entire post.
Alternately, edit the problem post in HTML mode, and find and remove all "stcpdiv" code - one section at a time.
And in the future, never copy formatted content from a protected website.
This is yet one more reason why copying formatted text is not a good idea. If you must copy text, copy it unformatted - then re apply formatting, as necessary, after copying.
