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Rich Text column for Document Libraries don't work as expected

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In this previous post, I discussed how I spent most of my evenings and vacation time updating my indieOpolis site to utilize WSS 3.0.

One of the things I wanted to accomplish during this "rebuild" was to utilize the Rich Text column type for the details section of each CD release I have, but I ran into a problem of

a) Being able to actually use the Built In Rich Text Editor control in the out of box edit page

b) And utilize that content via a Data View web part for displaying to the end user.

I found out that, apparently, you only get this feature if it's used in a list and NOT a document library.

Initially, I had created a custom content type with a base "Folder" content type.  The reason I did this, is that I wanted to create a Folder that I could use within a single document library to describe a specific release.   The folder would act as the container for all the relevant data (Documents, pages, etc, etc) related to that release.  I would then use the folder metadata to describe the release on the Product Details page.  The problem, is that I could not figure out why I couldn't use the out of box Rich Text control to edit the metadata for the "Details" column in the content type.

I then found that this same folder content type worked just fine when used in a list.  It didn't work when used in a document library.

So, it appears that rich text editing/displaying support of rich text columns is disabled when used within Document Libraries.

I'm still waiting on confirmation if this is by design, or perhaps a bug, and once I find out, I'll update you...but this was a real pain in the butt. :)  I thought I was doing something wrong, but then when I used that very same content type in a list, and it started working, I realized that it was because I was using it in a document library before.

Regardless, I moved forward with having a base product "list" that I use, then go back to the document library for all the other resources...it was just a pain to have to do that.  I was hoping I would be able to use one resource container for all.

The end result like the following:

https://www.indieopolis.net/Pages/ProductDetails.aspx?IPID=IPID0006

The section below the CD cover and track listing is a data view web part that is pulling the details column back out.  This was only available if the data was entered into an item in a list, not a document library.

If anyone has any additional information on if this should work or not, I'd be more than happy to hear.

- Keith

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