Writing Your Resume in HTML Format
STEP 1:
CREATE YOUR RESUME ON A WORD PROCESSOR AND PRINT IT.
EXPLANATION:
When writing your resume, consult English books, writing guides, or
take advantage of career services provided by many universities. Be
sure to have someone proofread and review your resume. Many
instructors in the English department of a University will gladly
proofread your resume, but be sure to give it to him/her enough in
advance to provide enough time to review it and so that it will not be
an inconvenience to him/her. Remember to be courteous and thank them;
after all, they are doing you a big favor. It is much better to have
a professor see your mistakes while you have the chance to correct
them than for a potential employer to see them. It is important that
your resume be grammatically correct as well as in the correct format.
Your resume is often the first impression an employer will receive.
It will be easier to "htmlify" your resume if you have already created
it. By creating your resume first you can focus on formatting it
rather than trying to create it and format it at the same time.
STEP 2:
SAVE YOUR WORD-PROCESSED RESUME IN TEXT (.txt) FORMAT.
EXPLANATION:
This can usually be done by using the "save as" option found under the
"file" utilities of your favorite word processor. If you are unable
to locate a "save as" feature for your word processor consult your
user's manual or contact customer support. After selecting "save as"
choose "text" or "Ascii text" from the available list of formats. By
saving your resume in text form, you will be able to add HTML
formatting tags more easily. Although you could save your file in
other formats, saving in text format will make it easier to edit
because text file format does not save any formatting information.
Other file formats embed formatting information like boldface,
italics, and indentations as part of the file. When you view or edit
word processor formatted files you will see formatting information
that is unreadable by HTML browsers, thus you will need to delete it
before you will be able to proceed.
STEP 3:
OPEN YOUR TEXT RESUME IN AN EDITOR.
EXPLANATION:
Editors allow you to change files without embedding formatting options
such as boldface, italics and underscoring into the file. Many
editors are available to use. Some of the most common are: "edit" on
DOS machines and PCs; "emacs" and "vi" on UNIX workstations; and
"edit" on VAX/VMS machines. You can also use your favorite word
processor to open a text file. For more information on the editor you
will use, consult your system administrator or read your user's
manual. Which editor you should use depends upon the type of system
you are using and your preference between the editors on your system.
Make sure you use an editor that you are familiar with. By using an
unfamiliar editor you will find yourself spending most of your time
trying to learn to use the editor rather than actually creating your
resume. Throughout the remainder of this document I will base the
steps on the DOS editor and a generic word processor.
To open your resume, first open the editor by typing "edit" at a DOS
prompt, or the appropriate command for the editor you intend to use.
Next, choose the "Open File" option from the "FILE" menu. Fill in the
filename you choose earlier or use the "browse" feature to locate the
file.
STEP 4:
ADD THE REQUIRED HTML TAGS.
EXPLANATION:
Elements of an HTML document are denoted using HTML tags. An HTML tag
usually consists of a left angle bracket (<) a tag name and a right
angle bracket (>). Tags are also usually paired (e.g. <P> and </P>),
the first is used to identify the beginning of the element and the
second (usually </tagname>) identifies the end of the element. Some
tags may also contain additional information. This information should
be placed inside the angle brackets. For example, to display a
paragraph using full justification use <P ALIGN="justify">. HTML
documents have a minimum requirement of tags. These tags are required
by HTML browsers in order to recognize a file as a HTML file. The
following is a summary of the required HTML tags:
Begin Tag End Tag Summary
-----------------------------------------------------------------
<html> </html> This element informs HTML browsers that the
following code contains HTML-coded information.
The file extension .html also indicates an
HTML document and must be used. You may replace
.html by .htm if you are restricted to three
digit file extensions.
<head> </head> This element identifies the first section of
your html. HTML is broken into two sections,
the head and the body. The head section
contains the title of your document, search
engine information, and more advanced
information such as Java functions. More
information about Java can be found in the
"For Further Interests" section of this
manual.
<title> </title> The title is not part of the document text.
The title is usually used by the browser to
label the display window. Some search engines
also use the title to search on. The title
should be kept short and sufficient to identify
the document.
<body> </body> The body element contains the contents of the
document. Any information to be displayed in
the document and any necessary formatting tags
should be contained inside the body tags.
The required HTML tags must be placed in the appropriate order inside
and HTML file. The following HTML is a simple example of the minimum
HTML document.
<html>
<title>Simple example of an HTML document</title>
<body>
<P>Information to be displayed is located here. This will be
displayed as paragraph 1.</P>
<P>This will be displayed as paragraph 2.</P>
</body>