Unlike web browsers, Microsoft Reader places a default positive indentation in front of the first line of text contained in a block element. You can override this value by specifying a negative value for the CSS property indent
. The default value for a standard indentation is one em. Indentation is measured from the current active margin of the block immediately containing the text.
When a block level element contains another block level element, and the contained element appears within text that is contained immediately by the outer element, indentation is applied at the first line of text in the outer element and is also applied at the first line of text following the contained element.
The text-indent
property is not inherited from one block element to another block element contained within it.
To accomplish hanging indents, specify a negative indentation value using the CSS text-indent
property (you might also choose to increase the value of the element's left margin as well). Note, however, that a negative indentation causes text to appear over the margin area, which is always transparent and therefore takes on the color of the underlying page. If a color other than the page color is specified for the background color of a text zone of a block element, the negative indent causes the first line of text to extend outside the colored text zone, and over the transparent margin zone. This causes a colored section hanging in the right margin.
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