From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([208.92.234.80] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1Nyat4-0007QI-Cv for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Mon, 05 Apr 2010 01:13:58 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 64CD6E0A8D; Mon, 5 Apr 2010 01:13:50 +0000 (UTC) Received: from smtp.gentoo.org (smtp.gentoo.org [140.211.166.183]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8280CE09F5 for ; Mon, 5 Apr 2010 01:13:39 +0000 (UTC) Received: from angelstorm (cpe-76-93-187-113.san.res.rr.com [76.93.187.113]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES128-SHA (128/128 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by smtp.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C51C91B40B1 for ; Mon, 5 Apr 2010 01:13:38 +0000 (UTC) Date: Sun, 4 Apr 2010 18:13:33 -0700 From: Joshua Saddler To: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org Subject: Re: [gentoo-dev] [Gentoo Phoenix] an official Gentoo wiki Message-ID: <20100404181333.6dab27c2@angelstorm> In-Reply-To: References: <20100403163010.1897d663@mail.a3li.li> <4BB7D11F.7060207@gentoo.org> <20100404003152.4b2012da@angelstorm> <20100404123323.1689e9d4@angelstorm> X-Mailer: Claws Mail 3.7.5 (GTK+ 2.18.7; x86_64-pc-linux-gnu) Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=PGP-SHA1; boundary="Sig_//06RF7_GSZ5EKaF1lzZoEg6"; protocol="application/pgp-signature" X-Archives-Salt: e8ee42fc-f591-4eb8-9bf5-dd9b7956dcde X-Archives-Hash: b093b3219ac23d8ce8d6642b0cecd91d --Sig_//06RF7_GSZ5EKaF1lzZoEg6 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On Mon, 5 Apr 2010 02:08:06 +0200 Ben de Groot wrote: > On 4 April 2010 21:33, Joshua Saddler wrote: > > Having to write a custom stylesheet just to get one wiki page to do what > > you want is pretty dumb. >=20 > Yes it would be. The idea is that you design consistent styling from > the get-go, so your stylesheets will be ready for those needs. Pretty > much the same as the current documentation solution. >=20 > > How is it unfair? Because tables really are so much simpler to write in > > GuideXML? >=20 > No, because they were displaying different things, using different featur= es. >=20 > > Here's a more complicated table: > > > > http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/xml-guide.xml#doc_chap2_sect10 > > source: http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/xml-guide.xml?passthru=3D1 >=20 > And you think that's intuitive? Tables are a bitch, and I think both > the GuideXML approach (copied from HTML) and the wiki syntax one are > equally unintuitive. In my opinion reStructuredText is offering a > better alternative: > http://docutils.sourceforge.net/docs/user/rst/quickref.html#tables At least the GuideXML approach to tables is familiar to anyone who's worked= with HTML. Oh wait, you shouldn't be comparing GuideXML with HTML. More on= that later in this message. Also, don't get me started on rST's many failings. It's just like wiki synt= ax, in that anything you want to do besides line spaces and lists involves = stupid nonsemantic code. Having to define URIs twice is retarded: "External hyperlinks sample sentence, like Python_." .. _Python: http://www.python.org/=20 Tables: A big problem with rST and wiki markup is that they try to preserve the ren= dered format within the source code view. +------------+------------+-----------+ | Header 1 | Header 2 | Header 3 | +=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D+=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D+= =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D+ | body row 1 | column 2 | column 3 | +------------+------------+-----------+=20 That's rST source. This gets unwieldy very quickly for larger tables, as th= ey'll overflow your editor window. Hey, that might not be a problem, but it= 's also a losing proposition to try to have that stuff rendered within the = source view. Let the renderer take care of the final rendering, as really, tags and mark= up are all arbitrary. What should matter is how it appears in your webbrows= er, since that'll vary from the source view anyways. . . . I hope you aren't seriously suggested rST as the wiki format. > > Mediawiki mostly involves memorizing how many quote or tick marks you u= se. >=20 > The beauty is: you don't have to memorize it, as it is just a click of > a button on the editor interface away. And not everyone will want to do that. I certainly don't like clicking arou= nd when it's easier and faster for me to just type the code myself. Really, you're mostly making a case for a graphical XML editor like Beacon,= rather than making a case for a wiki. :) > > This markup is *completely nonsemantic*. In GuideXML, you know EXACTLY = what > > each tag means. > No, I don't. The body and title tags are used quite differently from > HTML, which is confusing. When do I use section and when do I use > body? And what the frak is stmt? And why uri and figure instead of > HTML's a and img tags? Except to a few dedicated people, GuideXML is > confusing. That's your problem, then. Do you know what semantic means? Semantic doesn'= t mean "just like HTML." So stop treating it that way. Let's look at semant= ic tags. It's not hard to see that is a variable and that is a statemen= t, and is a comment. Semantic markup is markup that means what it= says. Using punctuation marks like ' '' ; : is neither semantically usefu= l nor easily readable, as I showed in the code samples you oh-so-casually s= kipped over. Nice try. ' and ' ' mean nothing in and of themselves. But you're not a web author, so I'll stop trying to beat you over the head = with how things work. Next point: > Having to mix HTML with a different dialect of XML is equally stupid, > and moreover it is confusing. At least with MediaWiki, you don't have > to use it, as there are other options. Why the hell do you keep bringing up HTML? Stop comparing GuideXML with HTM= L. Treat them as two separate languages, please. I only mentioned GuideXML in the context of "it's easier to learn because i= t has fewer tags than HTML" -- you operate under the mistaken assumption th= at GuideXML should be *like* HTML, and that HTML has too many tags. You ass= ume that everyone comes from an HTML background and thus will be confused b= y GuideXML. > What do you mean? You can predefine styles in your CSS to express your > "textual color palette" (if I understand correctly what you meant by > that). There is advanced code syntax highlighting available, for > example using GeSHi. Okay, then you also need a way to get those styles into your document by co= ming up with new tags or wiki markup. is a variable in GuideXML, and it'll be colored yellow. You mark this= variable in a 
 block with the  tag, which is created just for th=
is purpose. How do you accomplish this in, say, Mediawiki syntax? Without t=
rying to recycle some crap bit of HTML or tacking on inline styles.

Using  is ugly, because it's HTML. You should NEVER have to use more =
than one markup language at a time.

Do all the wikis out there have solutions for adding custom markup/tags?

> That's not fully correct. XML has in principle a practically infinite
> number of tags. It all depends on which "dialect" you use. If it is a
> dialect you do not use a lot, you will forget the usage of particular
> tags.

By "XML" I mean GuideXML.

And yes, clearly GuideXML and metadata.xml are some of your weak areas if y=
ou have to keep looking up the basics. However, with practice you *will* ge=
t better. :)

> > Most of us have used GuideXML at some point or another in our /proj/
> > webpages and devspaces, if not in /doc/en/. Guess what? That's the same
> > XML, and there's much, much more content constantly written for /proj/ =
and
> > dev.g.o than for /doc/. So don't try to tell me that people don't have =
at
> > least passing familiarity with it.
>=20
> That's not the point. The problem is that most of us don't use it
> often enough to be sufficiently fluent in it, and you will never use
> it for anything else but gentoo.org pages. Moreover, there is no web
> UI for quick edits, with helpful buttons and hints...

And you'll never use wiki syntax for anything but wiki pages. Specifically,=
 the syntax of whatever wiki is chosen, and not all wikis are equal, so the=
re's no guarantee that your syntax will be useful elsewhere. What's your po=
int?

Quick edits are edits that go right to the code, where you don't have to sl=
ow down by using anything but the keyboard. Work with web languages long en=
ough, and you'll appreciate not being hampered by a GUI.

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