Posting an article to a Proboards thread or to a PM is easy. A writer can post directly or, infinitely better, use a word processor and then copy and paste.  The writer doesn't need a fancy word processor either. Word Pad works just fine.
     Composing an article in Word Pad works best when the writer enters each paragraph as a single line, making sure to hit "Enter" only at the end of the paragraph. as soon as the article is finished, "word wrap" should be disabled. This is done by clicking on the "Format" tab at the upper left, then clicking on "word Wrap" in the drop down menu to uncheck it. These actions will ensure that the pasted text won't be fragmented and won't contain any unwanted line spaces when transferred.
     Paragraph structuring is an important consideration as well; even more so than one might think. There are two methods by which paragraphs may be structured.
     The more prevalent method involves indenting five spaces at the beginning of each paragraph. Indented paragraphs are separated by a single line space. This method is seen in books, newspapers and magazines.
     The other method involves no indenting at all. Instead, each paragraph is separated by two line spaces. This method is used in articles and documents published on the Internet, because simply tapping the space bar five times doesn't work with HTML (HyperText Markup Language) or UBBC (Universal Bulletin Board Code). Leading character spaces are ignored. Double spacing after periods and the like is not possible either. Multiple character spaces are treated as a single space.
     Indenting is preferable to double spacing where economy of space is concerned, which begs the question: how does a writer indent in HTML or UBBC? The answer is the Non-Breaking Space, " ". With five of these, the writer can indent very nicely. Articles using this method when transfered from Word Pad to an OSB thread or to a PM will display as indented text. Voila!
     On the downside, pasting to a PM, then recopying and repasting from the PM to a thread will result in the loss of the indentations unless the five non-breaking spaces are reapplied. An alternative to pasting the text of an article to a thread or to a PM directly is to paste it to CodePad, and to select the "Plain Text" button. When an article is pasted to CodePad, a link is generated. The writer can then provide that link instead of or in addition to pasting the text directly. Note that clicking "private" and unclicking "run code" at the bottom right of the box, prevents the text from being made available to search engines such as Google or Yahoo.*
     The writer needs a few editing tools to work with. So a Spell Checker, an online dictionary such as Dictionary.com or Merriam-Webster Online, and Roget's Thesaurus are a must.
     The writer also needs to be aware of how many words will be contained in the article being written. He or she can copy and paste the text from Word Pad to Word Count Tool, click "Submit," and then receive a very accurate count.
     Now, there are several additional, very useful web sites the dedicated writer can benefit from:  Computer Hope has a list of extended special HTML characters that are also applicable to UBBC. A basic list of Universal Bulletin Board codes (including two additional codes for our use not seen elsewhere) can be found here, while a much larger list can be found here; HTML color codes in both hexadecimal and RGB format can be found here. Additionally, kadifeli.com has a complete list of ANSI/ISO Character Codes, as well as an extended list of HTML Character Entity References.
     Finally, the ultimate tool, already at the writer's fingertips, is the Internet. If what the writer is looking for can't be found there, then it probably doesn't exist.