Clipboard & Text Processing

You can copy text from almost anywhere and paste it into the Rich Text Editor with the following steps.

Select the desired source text within the current browser window or another tab, window or application using the standard copy button or keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+C).
Click in the Rich Text Editor and position the typing cursor where you would like to paste the content.
Click the paste button or keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+V). As an alternative, you can also use the keyboard shortcut to paste without formatting (Ctrl+Shift+V).

The copied text should be inserted into the Rich Text Editor where the typing cursor was placed.

Depending on the source text, you may or may not need to adjust the formatting of the text.

Plain Text

When the source text is plain text, meaning it does not and cannot contain formatting, such as bold, italic, margins, etc., then the paste operation will simply insert the source text in the current format at the typing cursor.

It is important to note that even if the copied text does not contain formatting, but the application or place it is copied from can contain formatting (ie. a word processor), it may still contain hidden formatting that is not visible. To avoid pasting invisible formatting, you can paste with the keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+Shift+V).

As a more elaborate alternative, you can first copy and paste the source content to a plain text editor, such as Notepad in Windows. Then, copy and paste from the plain text editor into the Rich Text Editor. This will ensure the source text does not contain any formatting.

When multiple lines of plain text are pasted into the Rich Text Editor, blank lines are treated like a paragraph break. In other words, the following source plain text would produce 3 paragraphs.

Paragraph 1

Paragraph 2

Paragraph 3

When multiple lines of plain text are pasted into the Rich Text Editor without blank lines, it may insert as a single paragraph of text. In this case, you may need to press ENTER at the start of each paragraph of text to convert those individual line breaks to paragraph breaks.

Formatted Text

When the source text is formatted text, meaning it does or can contain formatting, such as bold, italic, margins, etc., then the main paste operation (Ctrl+V) will attempt to preserve all allowed formatting. Allowed formatting is limited to standard web page formatting as well as how the specific Rich Text Editor field is configured. Most allowed formatting options are typically available in the Rich Text Toolbar.

In many cases, you will not want to preserve the original formatting, or you will want to re-apply formatting more consistent with the rest of the text, or text within other content or pages. In this case, you can paste without formatting (Ctrl+Shift+V) or paste normally and then select the newly pasted text and click the Clear Formatting button () in the Rich Text Toolbar.