Member Avatar for meldex

Hi everyone

I am a bit of newby and would appreciate your help

I am used to DW MX - but have since updated to DW CS3

My problem is with the design view

When I press enter to create an end of paragraph line break - the text pushes up in the design view so it looks as though all my previous paragraph breaks have disappeared.

I cannot think of a reason why this should happen and I am finding it furstrating...

can anyone guide to a fix / setting that i need to alter?

best wishes

David

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by sreein1986

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described Design view text “pushing up” after creating new paragraphs, and correctly flagged that how breaks are handled matters. The practical root cause in most cases is CSS, not a Dreamweaver bug: either a reset stylesheet or an explicit rule is removing the default paragraph spacing, or adjacent paragraph margins are collapsing. Design view shows the page with whatever CSS is linked, so if the stylesheet sets p margins to zero or a very small line-height, paragraphs will look compressed.

Quick diagnostic checklist:

  • Use Dreamweaver’s CSS Styles panel to see which rule applies to the paragraph element and which stylesheet defines it.
  • Search linked CSS files for rules that target p (or for common reset files like reset.css/normalize.css) and temporarily disable that stylesheet to see whether spacing returns.
  • Test by adding a temporary inline rule on a paragraph to force spacing; if that fixes it, adjust the stylesheet instead of relying on manual breaks.
  • Always preview the saved page in an actual browser to confirm the final rendering — Design view is helpful, but the browser is authoritative.

A minimal CSS fix to restore clear paragraph spacing:

p {
  margin: 1em 0;
  line-height: 1.4;
}

Notes: adjacent vertical margins can collapse under CSS rules; read about collapsing margins and default paragraph behavior for full detail (p element, ). Adjust the stylesheet rather than inserting manual breaks so content remains semantic and consistent across browsers.

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Member Avatar for sreein1986

I think in your previous paragraph ta is empty so that it shows like a <br> tag

Member Avatar for sreein1986

Note this points
for enter - Paragraph
Shift+Enter - break a Line

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