Creating and Uploading a Webpage with
OpenOffice Writer
• Getting started
• Creating your webpage
• Uploading your webpage to
ALEX!
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Getting Started: Creating a Teacher Webpage on
ALEX
1. Create a new folder on your Desktop by clicking your right mouse button, scrolling
down to New, and clicking on Folder. (You will be placing all of your Teacher
Webpage content in this folder.) To rename the folder, right mouse click on the
folder and select rename, type name.
2. Title your new folder using your first or last name and “web,” for example,
csmithweb.
Note: When naming folders associated with your
webpage, do not use any capital letters, spaces,
underscores, dashes, numbers, or any other symbols.
3. Open this folder and create new subfolders inside this folder. (right click on your
mouse, scroll to New, and select Folder.) Name the first folder tabone. You will need
to create a new subfolder for each tab/webpage you create - tabtwo, tabthree,
tabfour, etc.
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4. Open Open Office and design your first webpage, (You will be saving this document as
both a Open Office document and as a filtered webpage.)
IMPORTANT: Any images you include in your document (other
than clipart) and any PowerPoints, Excel spreadsheets, videos,
or Word documents that you link to in this document must be
saved in the corresponding tabʼs folder. For example, if you
create a hyperlink to a PowerPoint or insert a picture of your class
on your first webpage (tabone), then you will need to save the
image and/or PowerPoint in the tabone folder. Save the images
and documents in the appropriate folder first. Then, insert the
images or create a hyperlink to the document.
Note: When naming folders associated with your
webpage, do not use any capital letters, spaces,
underscores, dashes, numbers, or any other symbols.
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5. Save and Name your Document
• Choose File→Save As.
• In the Save in: window, Browse to find your webpage folder on your desktop and
double-click folder to open it.
• Then, double-click on the folder tabone.
• File name: Name your file with a single word (or phrase
with no spaces) that indicates its role in your webpage, i.e. homepage,
calendar, schedule, or homework.
Note: When naming folders associated with your
webpage, do not use any capital letters, spaces,
underscores, dashes, numbers, or any other symbols.
homepage
• Click: Save.
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OpenOffice Writer 2.3.1
Using OpenOffice Writer with the ALEX webpage feature
Opening a Writer Document
1. At your Desktop click start.
2. Choose All Programs from the menu.
3. Choose OpenOffice.org 2.3 from the program menu.
4. Choose OpenOffice.org Writer.
Writer Toolbar
Your Writer Toolbar is very similar to the toolbar in the Microsoft Word software. To
activate any of the following functions simply click the button pertaining to the function you
wish to use.
Print and Print
Send Export to Preview Spell Check
Open a Document PDF File
Create New Saved as Email
Document Document
Font Name Font Size Bold, Italicize, and
Underline Text Left, Center, Right, Font Color, Highlight
and Justified Text, and Background
Alignment Color
You can also access the font style, font size, and alignment icons by clicking your right
mouse button.
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Undo your last action or restore a deleted action using your toolbar
1. Clicking the blue arrow pointing to the left in your toolbar will undo your last action.
2. Clicking the blue arrow pointing to the right in your toolbar will restore the last
action your previous action.
Undo your last action using the Edit menu
1. Select Edit from the menu bar.
2. You will see the “Undo” feature at the top
of the drop-down menu. The phrase that
follows “Undo” is determined by your last
action, i.e. delete typing, etc.
Copy – Cut – Paste
1. Highlight the text you want to copy.
2. Hold down the left mouse button and slide the mouse to where
you want to stop copying and let go of the mouse button.
3. If you wish to copy the text choose the Copy icon from your toolbar.
4. If you wish to cut the text choose the Cut icon from your toolbar.
Copy Cut Paste
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5. After you have either cut or copied your text you can paste it into another area of the
document by placing your cursor where you want the text to appear and clicking the
Paste icon in your toolbar.
6. You can also Copy, Cut, and Paste by using your right mouse button.
7. After highlighting an area of text, click your right mouse button and you will see a drop
down menu containing the same cut, copy, and paste icons.
Spell Checking
1. Your SpellCheck icon appears in your toolbar at the top of the
screen. When you click this icon, OpenOffice begins to review your
text and alerts you of any misspelled words. If a misspelled word is
found you will see a box. OpenOffice will suggest an alternate spelling
for the word and you can either choose to Change the word or Ignore
the suggestion.
2. If you have used the word multiple times in the document you can choose to Change
All and each appearance of the word will be changed or Ignore All and the spell
checker will ignore any other appearances of the word.
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3. OpenOffice also has an Auto Spell Check feature. Clicking on
this icon will allow OpenOffice to check your spelling as you
type. If it encounters a misspelled word, the software will notify
you by underlining the word with a red line.
Changing the font, font style, size of the font, color, etc.
1. In addition to using your toolbar, you can also change your
font style by using the Format key.
2. Click Format at the top of your screen.
3. Choose Font from the drop down menu.
4. You will see a screen displaying all of the program’s font options: Font, Font Effects,
Position, and Hyperlinks. This is also available through the dialogue box:
Select your font, font style, position, hyperlinks, and background, and click ok.
Clip Art
1. Before placing clipart in your webpage, save the selected clipart into your tab folder, i.e.
tabone, tabtwo, etc. The best way to insert clipart into your OpenOffice document is to
find the graphic you wish to use and copy and paste it directly into your document.
2. After you have done this, you can double click on your graphic to bring up a formatting
window. This window allows you to resize, crop, position, change colors, and add
borders to your graphic.
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3. OpenOffice also offers a Gallery feature. By clicking on the Gallery icon in your
toolbar you can bring up a listing of different backgrounds, bullets, page dividers, and
sound icons.
Other Images
1.To insert other images or pictures into
OpenOffice, use the same procedure used for
clipart.
Note: To insert pictures from the Internet, you must
first save the image to your tab folder, i.e. “tabone.”
2.To insert pictures from the Internet, you must first save the image to
your computer. Right click the image and choose Save Image As….
Choose a file and name for your image and click save.
3. In OpenOffice click Insert in the your toolbar at the
top of the screen. Scroll down to Picture and choose From File.
4. A screen will come up where you can find your picture. When you have found the
picture, click on it and choose Open.
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Inserting Hyperlinks
1. Choose and highlight the text that you want to appear as a hyperlink to a web site.
2. Click Insert at the top of your screen in the toolbar. Choose Hyperlink from the
drop down menu. A new window will pop up.
3. Here you can choose your hyperlink.
Links to Webpages
1. If you wish to link words in your text to a webpage on the Internet you must create a
web hyperlink.
2. Type the address of the webpage that the text will be linked to.
3. Indicate the text that will serve as the link in the box labeled Text.
4. You can also give your hyperlink a name by filling in the box labeled Name.
5. When you have finished filling out the page click Apply.
6. To access your hyperlink hold down the Ctrl key and click on the link.
Inserting an Email link
1. Choose Mail and News from the Hyperlink window.
2. Enter the email address in the box labeled Receiver.
3. In the box labeled text, indicate what words you would like the hyperlink to appear as.
4. Click Apply.
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Linking to another Document
1. Choose Document from the hyperlink window.
2. Click the folder icon next to the box labeled Path to browse your files.
3. Choose the file you wish the link to.
4. In the box labeled Text indicate the text you would like the hyperlink to appear as.
5. Click Apply.
6. You can use the same method to link to a new document.
Note: To insert pictures from the Internet, you must
first save the image to your tab folder, i.e. “tabone.”
Tables
1. To insert a table click Insert from your toolbar at the top of the screen.
Note: Tables may also be set up under the “Insert ->
Indexes and Tables” menu of the toolbar. For the purpose
of Teacher Webpages, we recommend the “table” option
from the toolbar.
2. Choose Insert→Table.
3. You will see a window with options for setting up your table.
4. First give your table a name.
5. Choose how many columns and rows you want your table to have.
6. You can also choose to have a header for your table or a border.
4. Click OK and your table will be created.
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Formatting your Table
1. When your table is created a small screen will appear in the upper left hand corner of
the screen. This is your formatting toolbar.
Borders
Line style and Line color
Merge Cells and Split Sum
Cells
Insert Row and Delete Row and
Insert Column Delete Column
2. To insert an extra row into your table, click the Insert Row button. The row will be
inserted below the row with your cursor in it.
3. To delete a row select the row you wish to delete and click Delete Row.
4. To insert a column click Insert Column. The column will be inserted to the right of
your cursor.
5. To delete a column select the column you wish to delete by moving your arrow over the
top the column and left clicking (the column will be highlighted). Click the Delete
Column button.
6. To merge two cells together highlight the cells and click the Merge Cells button.
7. To split two cells highlight the cells and click the Split Cells button.
8. The Sum button allows you to use the table to solve mathematical problems.
9. You can also format your table by highlighting it and clicking your right mouse button.
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Saving as a Webpage
Note: Be sure you have saved your OpenOffice document
before you save as a Webpage as a HTML document.
After saving your OpenOffice document, you must now save the document as a HTML
document (OpenOffice.org Writer) (.html)
a.
Choose File → Save As
b.
Save in: Browse to the same tab folder where the OpenOffice document is
stored (i.e., tabone).
c.
Save as Type: Choose HTML document (OpenOffice.org Writer)
(.html)
d.
Click Save.
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Uploading your Teacher Webpage_________________
1. When you have finished creating your webpage and have saved it as a Open Office
document, go to File → Save As. In the Save window, find the Save as type drop-down
menu at the bottom of the window. Click on the arrow and choose Webpage,
Filtered. Make sure you are saving the webpage in the tabone folder. Name your file
homepage.
DO NOT CLICK SAVE YET.
homepage
2. Once you have chosen Webpage, Filtered, you will see Page Title appear above the
File Name. This is the title of your webpage, which will appear at the top of the
Internet window when someone views your webpage.
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Click on Change Title. A small window will appear. Type in the title of your webpage and
click OK. Then, Click Save. A small window will then pop up. Click Yes. Close the file.
In your tabone folder, you should now see all of your linked images and documents, an Open
Office document, an HTML document (your webpage), and a folder named tabone_files
(this folder is automatically created when you save your webpage), i.e. homepage_files.
3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 for each tab folder, which represents each webpage.
Note: Each tab folder cannot exceed 8 MB in size.
All of your tab folders combined cannot exceed
30 MB in size.
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Note: Any time you edit your Open Office
document, you must re-save it as a Open
Office document and as a Webpage, Filtered.
A pop-up window may appear asking if you
want to replace the existing file(s). Click Yes.
4. When you have created all of your webpages, you will need to “zip”, or compress, each
folder individually to upload them onto ALEX. Right click on the tabone folder, scroll
down to Send To, and click on Compressed (zipped) Folder. A small window may
pop up. If so, click Yes to confirm.
You should now see a zipped file in your main webpage folder called tabone.
5. Repeat step 4 for each of your tab folders.
Note: Any time you edit your Open Office
document and HTML file (webpage), you must
delete the old ZIP file and re-zip the edited tab
folder. This ensures that all of your files include
your changes.
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6. You are now ready to upload your webpages to ALEX! Go to http://alex.state.al.us. Click
on Personal Workspace and log in using the username and password you created
and confirmed at the beginning of this training. Click on Create A Webpage.
7. You should see a screen that looks like the following:
Notice that there are only 3 tabs displayed. You can add more tabs by clicking the Add
button. You can create up to 8 tabs (8 webpages).
You can also remove tabs by clicking on a tab and clicking the Remove button.
8. Under Tab Name, type the name of each of your webpages. This will be the text that
is displayed on each of your webpage tabs. For example, you might name your tabs
Home, Homework, Class Schedule, and WebQuest Activities.
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9. You are now ready to upload your webpages! Click the Browse button next to Tab
Number 1. A File Upload window will appear. Find your webpage folder and double
click it to open the file. Find the zipped file named tabone. Click on it and click
Open.
10. You should now see the file location/path listed in the white box next to the browse
button. Click Save at the bottom of the screen.
11. Repeat steps 9 and 10 for each tab.
Note: You must click Save each time you upload a new file.
12. When you have finished uploading and saving all of your ZIP files, you can click View
to see your webpages.
13. You can now click Submit for Review so that your webpage can be reviewed and
posted.
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