Formatting content
Generally speaking, in the context of Web authoring, formatting is the act of modifying the appearance of textual content in some way. (Although you can also modify the appearance of images and other non-textual content, most people do not call that formatting.)
Every text element in HTML has a default appearance, which is how it looks if you don’t apply any specific formatting to it. For example, most Web browsers display ordinary paragraphs in a medium-sized serif font, with left alignment, and with top and bottom margins. (The exact default appearance of any particular element depends on the browser, but it is based on commonly-accepted norms. Some browsers allow users to set up their own default styles for various elements.) To override an element’s default appearance, you can format it in various ways—for instance, by changing its font or alignment.
In this section
Applying a single-instance format
Setting character-related properties
Setting paragraph alignment, indentation, and line height
Setting margins, padding, and borders
Setting background colors and images
Understanding measurement units
Copying and pasting formatting