The Elusive HTML Apostrophe

Factual Questions
1

I am creating my HTM web pages with MS Word. Every time I use an apostrophe, like in “you’re”, the apostrophe is changed to a “box”, like “youre”.

Any idea how to control this menace?

2

Try turning off Smart Quotes.

3

Also be sure to use an apostrophe ’ instead of an accent mark ´.
BTW if it’s not just one or two pages you’ll generate in your lifetime it would be a good idea to use a real HTML editor. MS Word generates very bloated HTML.

4

Unfortunately, HTML does not recognize true apostrophes [’] or quotation [ “” ] marks in text. In their place, you can use the hashmarks [’] or ["] that most of us recognize as the same thing.

More about the distinction here:

http://www.fontsite.com/Pages/RulesOfType/ROT1097.html

Another option is using the HTML “special character” code for the true marks. It looks as if Word does not automatically do this for you, but you can go in and fix the code after saving in HTML format. See:

http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/reference/special_characters/

5

If you’ve already typed up a document that you would like to make HTML-compatible, you can turn off Smart Quotes as advised above; then do a Find and Replace on the mark itself (ie, find the adjusted quote, replace with the true mark). You might have to do this for both double/single quotes and apostrophes.

Another option is to open up the doc in Wordpad and do the same thing. You don’t have to worry about Smart Quotes there.