Event organizers will often place limits on formatting permitted in text fields. This is to make sure the text collected is clean and easy to format for publication. They may not want to permit tables, bold, underline, or embedded images. These limits may be different for each event.
Underlining and Math Symbols
One should never use an underline as a way to add "or equal" to mathematic symbols such as ± ≥ ≤ and so on, as it is too easy for formatting to be stripped out, and search engines ignore underlines. Instead, use the actual Unicode symbol characters like you see here.
If the text box features a formatting toolbar, click the Ω button to bring up a panel of symbols to insert.
Here are some alternatives to find the symbols you need:
- Windows comes with the Character Map application. Press Windows + Q on your keyboard to open the Windows Search box. Type the phrase character map in the search box and press the Enter key.
- Recent versions of Mac OS X have a Character Viewer built in. From the Edit menu, select Emoji & Symbols. Then click the little "window" symbol in the upper right of the window to expand it into the Character Viewer.
- Wikipedia has a good table of mathematical characters worth keeping as a bookmark.
Superscripts and Subscripts in Titles
Some applications do not support the superscript or subscript styling in titles. If you see your superscripts or subscripts stripped out, one workaround is to copy and paste the appropriate Unicode characters instead. There is a limited set of characters available:
| Superscript Numeric | ⁰ ¹ ² ³ ⁴ ⁵ ⁶ ⁷ ⁸ ⁹ ⁺ ⁻ ⁼ ⁽ ⁾ ⁿ |
| Subscript Numeric | ₀ ₁ ₂ ₃ ₄ ₅ ₆ ₇ ₈ ₉ ₊ ₋ ₌ ₍ ₎ |
| Subscript Latin | ₐ ₑ ₒ ₓ ₔ ₕ ₖ ₗ ₘ ₙ ₚ ₛ ₜ |
Tables and Figures
Tables may be disabled in formatted text boxes, depending on the event organizers' preference. Figures cannot be collected in text boxes for compatibility reasons.
- If you are unable to paste a table into a text box, see if the form later has an upload field to permit you to upload the table in Microsoft Word format.
- If there is an upload field available, please only upload what is requested. For example, do not upload your entire paper. If only tables are being collected, do not also include figures in your Word file.
- If there are no upload fields available, the organizers may not be collecting tables and figures at that time, or not at all.
If you have questions about why tables or figures are not being collected on the form, please direct them to the event organizers.
Paragraphs and Line Breaks
If paragraph breaks are being stripped out when you enter your text in the form, this is being done at the event organizers' request. If you have questions about why paragraphs or line breaks are not being collected on the form, please direct them to the event organizers.
General Formatting Questions
Please send formatting questions to the event organizers directly, as CATALYST Technical Support does not determine formatting restrictions, and has no authority to grant formatting exceptions.