Creating a CSS style sheet

Create a CSS style sheet to automate the formatting of HTML tags or a range of text identified by a CLASS attribute.

To create a CSS style sheet:

1 Choose Window > CSS Styles and click the New Style icon in the CSS Style palette.
2 Choose from the following CSS style options:
Make Custom Style (Class) Creates a style that can be applied as a CLASS attribute to a range or block of text.
Redefine HTML Tag Redefines the default formatting of a specified HTML tag.
Use CSS Selector Defines the formatting for a particular combination of tags or for all tags that contain a specific ID attribute.
3 Enter a name, tag, or selector for the new style:
Custom CSS style names must begin with a period. If you don't enter the period yourself, Dreamweaver enters it for you.
To redefine an HTML tag style, enter an HTML tag or choose one from the pop-up menu.
For a CSS selector, enter any valid criteria for a selector (for example, TD H2 or #myStyle), or choose a selector from the pop-up menu.
4 Click a panel name on the left side of the dialog box, and choose the formatting settings for the new CSS style in the corresponding panel. Leave attributes empty if they are not important to the style.
Attributes that do not appear in the Document window are marked with an asterisk (*) in the Style Definition dialog box. Some of the CSS style attributes that you can set with Dreamweaver appear differently in Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 and Netscape Navigator 4.0, and some are not currently supported by any browser.

See the following topics for information on specific settings:

Style Definition Type panel
Style Definition Background panel
Style Definition Block panel
Style Definition Box panel
Style Definition Border panel
Style Definition List panel
Style Definition Positioning panel
Style Definition Extensions panel

When you create a custom (class) style, it appears in the CSS Style palette and in the Text > CSS Styles submenu. HTML tag styles and CSS selector styles do not appear in the CSS Style palette because they cannot be applied; they are reflected in the Document window automatically wherever the tag or selector occurs.