[Wikipedia-l] Re: Parsing

[Tom Parmenter]

Resent after bounce, change in subscriber name.  
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|From: tarquin <tarquin at planetunreal.com>
|Date: Tue, 30 Jul 2002 12:55:57 +0100
|
|Steve Callaway wrote:
|
|>It occurs to me that there is going to be an awful lot of reworking if we
|>ever do go to an XML format Wikipedia (and this definitely needs discussion
|>at some point soon). I would have said that HTML is a more generally
|>accepted standard and that Wiki formatting is a highly localised phenomenon.
|>You can do a lot more with HTML format than you ever can with Wiki
|>formatting.
|>
|Au contraire. The beauty of Wiki Markup is that is is independent of 
|what is sent to the browser.
|When XML finally (!) hits the road, all it will take is a few tweaks to 
|the script so '' is converted to a different tag instead of <I>, and we 
|can go on writing wiki markup as before.
|If anything, XML is another reason for preferring wiki markup to HTML.
|Another good reason, from http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WhyWikiWorks, is:
| > It's an intelligence test of sorts to be able to edit a wiki page. 
|It's not rocket science, but it doesn't appeal to the VideoAddicts 
|<http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?VideoAddicts>. If it doesn't appeal, they don't 
|participate, which leaves those of us who read and write to get on with 
|rational discourse.
|

My markup experience goes back to 1978, when Runoff was a pup found on
the doorstep by the FAA in Oklahoma City, and goes on through the
various *ROFFS, DEC's own RNO, Symbolics Concordia (where I was doc
manager), VAX Document (whose development group I managed), HTML, XML
(a disastrous experience with Arbortext products), and a couple of
others I can't now recall, as well as Framemaker and other word
processors, so it is with some authority that I can say that Wiki
Markup is the best, most comfortable, pound-for-pound most functional
markup language I have ever used.

It is simple, easy to learn, and provides almost all that any writer
needs to do the job of putting words in order.  Tables are dreadful,
but they almost always are.  Some kind of simple table specifier that
would permit creation of two-column and three-column tables is about
the only thing I miss.  Even there, you can do most of what you want
just by putting a blank space at the beginning of a line.

The ability to sneak out into HTML is handy, but prone to non-wikiness
if the next person to come along can't figure out some arcanely nested
construction.  A back door to XML would be a mistake in my opinion
because you can do *anything* with XML and I don't think we want to be
able to *anything*, we want *anyone* to be able to edit a page.

Implement in XML, sure, but hide it, because I don't ever want to code
in it.  I don't really want to code at all, and Wiki Markup gives me
the impression that I'm not coding and I don't have to.

Ortolan88
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