New feature: HTML default descriptions

Posted by Mathew Patterson on April 14, 2008 4:59 PM

When you are creating MailBuild templates, you can provide default text that will show up in the editable areas, so your client can choose to change it, or leave the default.

For example, your template might have a section called "Joanne's Update" every month, but twice a year it is "Bill's Update". You would set the default to "Joanne's Update" and let your client edit it when needed.

Today we have made default descriptions a little bit smarter, by extending them to allow HTML tags inside your default text. So now you can include links in your default text, for example:

<$description default='<a href="http://www.yoursite.com/contact">Contacts: </a><br />Ph 09 481 1111<br />Click Reply to email us'$>

The URL might change for a different store, and your client can just edit the text without you needing to edit the template. Any time you have a section that is normally the same but should be editable, you can embed the HTML into the default section.

Thanks to all the customers who have suggested this!

4 total comments:

Kathy April 22, 2008 12:09 AM

This is great, but is there any way to stop it from breaking when you have an apostrophe in the text?

Thanks, and great addition!!
Kathy

Jason April 22, 2008 10:48 AM

Hi Kathy,

The reason this would be appearing to "break" is because we treat our default attribute like normal html ones, and the apostrophe or single quote is closing the value part of the default attribute.

So, if you have opened the value part of the attribute with single quotes, it will be closed with one also, meaning the content cannot contain one. If you want a single quote in the value part, use double quotes (") to signify the start and end of the value. The reverse is also true; if you want double quotes in the value part, use singles to open and close.

Mark May 2, 2008 2:32 AM

Is it possible to do this with images too? Example..... We want to create a template for multiple companies to use which has space to put a logo in. We would include a default image which is an image saying "insert your logo here"

Cheers
Mark

Dave Greiner May 26, 2008 10:20 PM

Good call Mark, we're planning on including default images in an upcoming release, so keep your eye on the blog for the announcement.