This page is a quick-reference guide describing the changes to the editor in Confluence 4.0 and later, showing you how to perform your day-to-day tasks in the new editor. This guide is for people who regularly used the Rich Text Editor in earlier versions of Confluence.
How to Get Started Quickly
- Try the commands and menus you know from the old Rich Text Editor. The new editor incorporates much of the existing functionality.
- Learn the keyboard shortcuts. Click the help icon
on the editor toolbar to see a list of keyboard shortcuts.
- Undo the autocomplete and autoformat actions. To undo something that autocomplete or autoformat has done, press Backspace on your keyboard. Alternatively, press Ctrl+Z (Windows) or Cmd+Z (Mac).
Before and After Guide
Below are the most commonly used menu options from the old Rich Text Editor, and instructions on how to perform the same actions in the new editor.
Using the Editor
What You Did Before | What to Do Now |
---|---|
Basic typing and editing: | Your experience should be much the same. Generally, the transition from using the Confluence 3.5 Rich Text Editor to the new Confluence 4 editor should be smooth. Try doing things the way you always did, and check the table below if you can't find the feature you're looking for. |
Adding Macros
What you did before | What to do now (press Enter to complete actions) |
---|---|
Adding a macro to your page: | Type '{' and start typing the macro name to see a list of macros that match your text. Press the arrow keys to select the macro you want. Example: Alternatively, use wiki markup entirely. Type the macro, including its parameters and the closing curly bracket. As soon as you close the macro, Confluence will convert it to rich text format and add it to the page. This means that you can skip the macro browser.
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Formatting Text
What you did before | What to do now |
---|---|
Making text bold, italic or underlined: | No change. |
Heading levels: | No change. |
Left, centre and right alignment: | Click the left, centre and right alignment buttons on the editor toolbar:![]()
|
Indentation: Click the left and right indentation buttons on the editor toolbar: ![]() | No change. Click the left and right indentation buttons on the editor toolbar: |
Making text strikethrough, monospace, superscript or subscript: | Click this button on the editor toolbar and select from the drop-down list. Example:![]() |
Quoting text: | No change: Use the Quote style – select 'Quote' from the style dropdown menu or use the keyboard shortcut. Example: |
Changing text colour: | No change: Click the colour options on the editor toolbar. Example: |
Adding Symbols and Emoticons
What you did before | What to do now |
---|---|
Smiley: | Type the globally-recognised markup for a smiley face (colon and round bracket), a wink (semicolon and round bracket), and so on. Autocomplete will convert it as you type. Example:
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Tick or check mark: | Type a forward slash in round brackets. Autocomplete will convert it as you type. Example:
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Linking text
What you did before | What to do now (press Enter to complete actions) |
---|---|
Linking to a Confluence page: | Type a square bracket '[' and start typing the page name to see the suggested pages to link to. Press the arrow keys to select the page you want. Example: Alternatively, use wiki markup entirely. Type the link, including the alias and the page name or URL. As soon as you type the closing square bracket, Confluence will convert the link to rich text format and add it to the page. This means that you can skip the link browser.
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Linking text to a web page: | Type a square bracket '[' and select 'Insert Web Link', then paste the URL into the link dialog. Example: Alternatively, use wiki markup entirely. Type the link, including the alias and the URL. As soon as you type the closing square bracket, Confluence will convert the link to rich text format and add it to the page. This means that you can skip the link browser.
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Linking to a page that does not yet exist: | Type a square bracket '[' and the name of the non-existent page, then select 'Insert Link to Create Page'. Example:![]() Alternatively, use wiki markup entirely. Type the link, including the alias and the page name or URL. As soon as you type the closing square bracket, Confluence will convert the link to rich text format and add it to the page. This means that you can skip the link browser.
|
Linking to a mailto:username@example.com
| No change. mailto:username@example.com |
Linking to an anchor on a page: | No change. |
Linking to an attachment: | Type a square bracket '[' and start typing the attachment name to see the suggested attachments to link to. Press the arrow keys to select the item you want. Example: Alternatively, use wiki markup entirely. Type the link, including the alias (if required), the caret character
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Using bulleted and numbered lists
What you did before | What to do now (press Enter to complete actions) |
---|---|
Adding bullets: | Type an asterisk '*' followed by a space. Autoformat will convert the line to a bulleted list. You can continue typing your text immediately. Example:
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Adding numbered items: | Type a hash or pound '#' followed by a space. Autoformat will convert the line to a numbered list. You can continue typing your text immediately. Example: |
Adding line breaks in a numbered/bulleted list: | No change. You can still press Shift+Enter. |
Using tables
What you did before | What to do now |
---|---|
Adding a table: | Type a series of pipe characters '|' then press Enter. Autoformat will convert the pipes to a table. Example – to create a table with three columns:
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Editing a table: | No change, you can still use the toolbar table editing controls, with new features such as table merge and split. |
Displaying images
What you did before | What to do now (press Enter to complete actions) |
---|---|
Displayed an image attached to the page: !NoMatterWhat.png! | Type an exclamation mark '!' and start typing the image name to see the suggested images to insert onto the page. Press the arrow keys to select the item you want. Example:![]() Alternatively, use wiki markup entirely. Type the wiki markup for the image insertion, including the exclamation marks, the space and/or page name (if different from the current page) and the image name, as well as any other allowed parameters. As soon as you type the closing exclamation mark, Confluence will convert the image to rich text format and add it to the page. This means that you can skip the image browser.
|
Displaying an image attached to another page: | Click 'Insert' > 'Search' and type search terms to find the image in Confluence. Once found, click the image and it will be added to the page. |
Embedding multimedia files
What you did before | What to do now (press Enter to complete actions) |
---|---|
Embedding a video, movie or audio file into a page: | Use the Multimedia macro. Type an exclamation mark '!' and select 'Insert Other Media'. Example: |
Functionality that is No Longer Available
This section contains a list of things you could do in in earlier versions of Confluence, but can no longer do in Confluence 4.
- Edit a page in Microsoft Word. See FAQ entry.