Access your style sheets at the My Style Sheets page.
Style Sheets allow you to create your own lists of style guidelines or reminders for specific projects or other purposes (see 2.55 and fig. 2.3 for use and examples of style sheets). Style Sheets may include text pasted directly out of The Chicago Manual of Style Online and live links to Manual paragraphs as well as material you have created. Your style sheets may collectively contain up to 35,000 characters.
Creating Style Sheets
If you wish to create a Style Sheet from scratch, follow the instructions here. If your new Style Sheet will be based largely on another Style Sheet that you have already created, you may prefer to follow the instructions below under Copying Style Sheets.
1. At the top of the My Style Sheets page, click on the New Style Sheet link. A new Style Sheet will open with several editable fields.
2. In the Title field, give your Style Sheet a title. This title will be the primary identifier of the Style Sheet on the My Style Sheets page.
3. In the Applies To field, list any additional information that will help you identify the Style Sheet, such as the author or title of the project to which it applies. This information, which is optional, will also appear on the My Style Sheets page.
4. In the text-editing pane, create and format the text of your Style Sheet (see also Formatting Style Sheets below). You may also copy text directly from the Manual and paste it into your Style Sheet.
5. When you are finished creating the Style Sheet, click on the Save button beneath the text-editing pane. If you wish to discard the Style Sheet, click on the Cancel button instead.
6. The Style Sheet will be listed on the My Style Sheets page, with the title and any other identifying information you supplied as well as the date and time when it was last edited. If you have more than one Style Sheet, the sheets will automatically be listed alphabetically by title, though you can also sort them by the Applies To and Last Edited fields by clicking on the relevant column heads.
Formatting Style Sheets
Within the text-editing pane, you can format all or portions of your Style Sheet using many functions common to word-processing programs.
Using the drop-down menus, you can
- Apply one of the predefined text formats
- Select a font and a relative font size
Using the toolbar, you can
- Add boldface, italic, underlining, or strike-through to text
- Change the font color
- Highlight text
- Change the alignment of text
- Convert text to a numbered list or a bulleted list
- Add or remove indents
- Add a horizontal rule
- Add subscripts or superscripts
- Insert special characters
- Insert live links to Manual paragraphs
- Undo or redo your most recent changes, or remove all character-level formatting
Viewing Style Sheets
All your style sheets appear in a list on the My Style Sheets page.
If you have more than one Style Sheet, the sheets will automatically be listed alphabetically by title, though you can also sort them by the Applies To and Last Edited fields by clicking on the relevant column heads.
To view an individual Style Sheet, click on its title. To return to the list of Style Sheets, click on the Back to the List link at the top of the page, or use the navigation buttons in your browser.
To return to the text of the Manual, use the top menu.
Editing Style Sheets
To edit a Style Sheet,
1. Go to the My Style Sheets page and click on the title of the Style Sheet you wish to edit.
2. Click on the Edit button on the top or bottom of the Style Sheet.
3. The Style Sheet will open in a text-editing pane, allowing you to edit or format the Style Sheet (see also Formatting Style Sheets above).
4. When you are finished editing the Style Sheet, click on the Save button beneath the text-editing pane. If you wish to discard your changes to the Style Sheet, click on the Cancel button instead.
5. The Last Edited field on My Style Sheets page will be updated immediately.
Copying Style Sheets
If you wish to create a Style Sheet that is based largely on one you have already created, you can copy the existing Style Sheet, save it as a new Style Sheet, and edit it as needed.
To copy a Style Sheet,
1. Go to the My Style Sheets page, click on the checkbox next to the title of the Style Sheet you wish to copy, and then click on the Copy button at the top or bottom of the page. Or, click on the title of the Style Sheet you wish to copy, and then click on the Copy button at the top or bottom of the Style Sheet.
2. A new Style Sheet will open that is identical to the one copied, except that the title will read “Copy of [original title].” You can edit the title, the Applies To field, and the text of the Style Sheet as needed (see also Formatting Style Sheets above).
3. When you are finished editing the Style Sheet, click on the Save button beneath the text-editing pane. If you wish to discard your changes to the Style Sheet, click on the Cancel button instead.
4. The Style Sheet will be listed on the My Style Sheets page, with the title and any other identifying information you supplied as well as the date and time when it was last edited.
Searching Style Sheets
When you are logged in to the Manual site, any Style Sheets you have created are searchable along with the rest of the site’s contents. Search results that appear within Style Sheets are listed under the Notes & Style Sheets tab.
Deleting Style Sheets
To delete a Style Sheet,
1. Go to the My Style Sheets page, click on the checkbox next to the title of the Style Sheet you wish to delete, and then click on the Delete button at the top or bottom of the page. (You can delete more than one Style Sheet at once by checking multiple boxes.) Or, click on the title of the Style Sheet you wish to delete, and then click on the Delete button at the top or bottom of the Style Sheet.
2. When the dialogue box appears, click on OK to delete the Style Sheet or Cancel to stop the deletion.
Printing Style Sheets
You can print a Style Sheet using your browser’s print function while you are in View Style Sheet mode. Alternatively, you can save Style Sheets and print saved copies from your local system.
Saving Style Sheets to Your Local System
You can save your Style Sheets to your local system and view them without logging in to the Manual site.
To save a Style Sheet to your local system,
1. Go to the My Style Sheets page and click on the title of the Style Sheet you wish to save.
2. Click on the Save To icon, which is the second icon to the right of the View Style Sheet heading.
3. A new window will appear within the browser, displaying the page to be saved. At the bottom of the window, click on Yes to save the page or No to cancel the save.
4. Follow the prompts provided by your browser to save the page to your local system.
5. The page will be saved as an HTML file in the default location on your local system as specified in your browser settings. Any links within the page to Manual sections will be live, but to access the content indicated by the links, you will need to be logged in to the Manual site.
Emailing Style Sheets
You can email your Style Sheets to one or more people.
To email a Style Sheet,
1. Go to the My Style Sheets page and click on the title of the Style Sheet you wish to email.
2. Click on the Email icon, which is the first icon to the right of the View Style Sheet heading.
3. A new window will appear within the browser with the standard fields for an email message. The page to be emailed will appear as an attachment, which you can view by clicking on the link.
4. Fill in the email address(es) of the intended recipient(s) of the email message. The From field will automatically list the email address associated with your Manual account.
5. If you wish, you may add a message in the text box, and you may also edit the subject line provided by the email feature.
6. At the bottom of the window, click on Send or Cancel.
7. The page will be sent as an HTML file. Any links within the page to Manual sections will be live, but to access the content indicated by the links, the recipient will need to be a Manual subscriber and will need to log in to the site.