You can think of content items as a kind of sub-document. A content item contains both structure and content, just like a document. But, you cannot ‘generate’ a content item as you can a document. Content items can only be used as part of other content items or documents. In fact, reuse of content and structure is the sole purpose of a content item.

Both parts of the content item are visible in the content item editor:

1. In the form of a tree, that shows the structure of the content items in a document.
2. In a preview, the preview shows the content items in a document in a linear textual form.

Whenever a content node is selected in the tree, its content is highlighted in the document preview and vice versa.

The structure of a content item consists of:

• content nodes of type text,
• other content items or
• content nodes of type image.

A content node can have the following properties:

• Pre-condition, specifies under what conditions the content of the node should be displayed.
• Repetition, specifies for which instances to display the content of the node, e.g. repeat a paragraph for all products in your application.
• Content style, defines the layout of the content in the node, e.g. a chapter is always preceded by a page break.
• Presentation style, defines the formatting of the content in a node, e.g. the font face, colour, etc.

There are two ways to create a new content item, creating it from scratch or turn a content node into a content item. A content item is in fact a reusable content node.

To create a new content item:

1. On the Document tab, in the document group, click the New content item icon.
2. Or open the content item’s list view and use keyboard shortcut CTRL + N.
3. Enter the content item’s name.
4. Click Save or Save and close.

To turn a content node into a content item:

1. Open a document or Content item.
2. Select the node that you want to turn in to a Content item from the tree-view.
3. Select Make reusable – as Content item from the shortcut menu.
4. Click Save or Save and close.

The new content item will not be saved until you save the entire document or content item that contains this new content item.

1. Select the node you want to move.
2. On the documents tab, in the outline tools group, click one of the move icons. You can also use one of the keyboard shortcuts CTRL+I (up), CTRL+K (down), CTRL+J (left) or CTRL+L (right).
3. Or select one of the Move options from the shortcut menu. Repeat this until the node is in the desired position.

If you are not allowed to move a node to a specific location, that specific move option will be read-only in the menu and ribbon.

To merge text via the content tree:

1. Select a text content node in the tree that you want to merge with the previous or with the next text content node on the same level.
2. Select Merge with next or Merge with previous from the shortcut menu or the document tab, in the outline tools group.

You are not allowed to merge reusable text or content items, since this would affect multiple documents or content items. In these cases the merge option will be disabled.

When you merge, be aware that properties of the top content node are preserved, while properties of the other node are lost. Any conditions and styles within the text are preserved. ‘Soft’ line breaks are inserted between the merged paragraphs.