As part of their "best Ajax" article:
http://www.ddj.com/dept/architect/192203368?pgno=7
Welcome to the 1980s. Want to make text bold? You'll
have to put the characters * and * around it. For big
text, first type in h1. All that's missing is a DOS
prompt and a floppy disk. No thanks -- been there,
done that.
Later,
--
Bil Kleb
http://fun3d.larc.nasa.gov
Bil Kleb wrote:
As part of their "best Ajax" article:
Review: The Best Ajax-Based Apps | Dr Dobb's
Welcome to the 1980s. Want to make text bold? You'll
have to put the characters * and * around it. For big
text, first type in h1. All that's missing is a DOS
prompt and a floppy disk. No thanks -- been there,
done that.
The browser address bar is the DOS prompt. Welcome the the 21st C. Besides, WYSIWYG is so '90s.
I much prefer Writely to Writeboard, but this reviewer so misses the point it's laughable.
(I think the last good issue of Dr. Dobbs was the 30th anniversary one.)
--
James Britt
"Judge a man by his questions, rather than his answers."
- Voltaire
As always, Different Strokes for Different Folks.
Applications like Word and, apparently, Writeboard aren't word processors anymore. They are desktop publishers. People spend way to much time "prettying up" throw-away documents, such as interoffice memos (IOM), email, etc. E.g. A lot of people at my employer use Word to write an IOM announcing, say, someones promotion. 5k of text becomes 200k+ with the logo in the header, formatting commands and so on. Who knows how much time they spend changing paragraph indentation, kerning, line spacing, etc.
Very often I need something just a little more expressive than standard text. Perhaps a bulleted list, emphasis here and there, maybe links to external resources. I find RedCloth (in the form of Textile) to be excellent for this purpose.
In effect the DDJ article reviewers were looking for Word, and wound up bashing a markup language.
Regards,
JJ
On Mon, 28 Aug 2006 22:35:10 -0400, Bil Kleb <Bil.Kleb@NASA.gov> wrote:
As part of their "best Ajax" article:
Review: The Best Ajax-Based Apps | Dr Dobb's
Welcome to the 1980s. Want to make text bold? You'll
have to put the characters * and * around it. For big
--
Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: Opera Web Browser | Faster, Safer, Smarter | Opera
Whoa whoa whoa there. We're on comp.lang.ruby, so we must use
appropriate ruby logic!
Matz is Nice -> Matz made Ruby -> Ruby is Red -> Redcloth is Red and
Ruby -> Redcloth is Nice!
Tada.
Anyways I think that Markdown, Textile, Redcloth, RDoc (I really like
it!), and all the rest of the wiki style markup syntaxes are an
acquired taste. I love them because I can focus on what I'm writing
instead of formatting things. WYSIWIG has some appeal, but how many
times have you tried to make a list in Word and have it do utterly the
wrong thing, or try to not make a list which Word insists will become a
list?
Anyways, in the long run, some people will like markup interfaces, some
will prefer WYSIWIG stuff, but it's really just that, a preference. I
think that quote was a little short sited, but hey that's probably
because I dig these markup syntaxes.
.adam
Bil Kleb wrote:
As part of their "best Ajax" article:
James Britt wrote:
Bil Kleb wrote:
As part of their "best Ajax" article:
http://www.ddj.com/dept/architect/192203368?pgno=7
Welcome to the 1980s. Want to make text bold? You'll
have to put the characters * and * around it. For big
text, first type in h1. All that's missing is a DOS
prompt and a floppy disk. No thanks -- been there,
done that.The browser address bar is the DOS prompt. Welcome the the 21st C.
Besides, WYSIWYG is so '90s.I much prefer Writely to Writeboard, but this reviewer so misses the
point it's laughable.(I think the last good issue of Dr. Dobbs was the 30th anniversary one.)
Well now ... I agree with Dr. Dobbs in this case. Give me WYSIWYG or
give me HTML, but don't make me learn a *third* language to mark up text!
-> Matz is Redcloth ?
Regards,
JJ
On Thu, 31 Aug 2006 12:30:42 -0400, Adam Sanderson <netghost@gmail.com> wrote:
Matz is Nice -> Matz made Ruby -> Ruby is Red -> Redcloth is Red and
Ruby -> Redcloth is Nice!
--
Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: Opera Web Browser | Faster, Safer, Smarter | Opera
As part of their "best Ajax" article:
Review: The Best Ajax-Based Apps | Dr Dobb's
Welcome to the 1980s. Want to make text bold? You'll
have to put the characters * and * around it. For big
text, first type in h1. All that's missing is a DOS
prompt and a floppy disk. No thanks -- been there,
done that.The browser address bar is the DOS prompt. Welcome the the 21st C.
Besides, WYSIWYG is so '90s.I much prefer Writely to Writeboard, but this reviewer so misses the
point it's laughable.(I think the last good issue of Dr. Dobbs was the 30th anniversary one.)
Well now ... I agree with Dr. Dobbs in this case. Give me WYSIWYG or
give me HTML, but don't make me learn a *third* language to mark up text!
Didn't you mean to say "don't make me learn a <b>third</b> language to mark up text" ?
Sorry... I just couldn't help myself
M. Edward (Ed) Borasky wrote:
James Britt wrote:
The browser address bar is the DOS prompt. Welcome the the 21st C.
Besides, WYSIWYG is so '90s.I much prefer Writely to Writeboard, but this reviewer so misses the
point it's laughable.(I think the last good issue of Dr. Dobbs was the 30th anniversary one.)
Well now ... I agree with Dr. Dobbs in this case. Give me WYSIWYG or
give me HTML, but don't make me learn a *third* language to mark up
text!
Bleh, give me something BETTER than HTML, which is RedCloth.
Joe
--
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/\.
No . . . but Redcloth is Matz!
On Fri, Sep 01, 2006 at 01:52:44AM +0900, John Johnson wrote:
On Thu, 31 Aug 2006 12:30:42 -0400, Adam Sanderson <netghost@gmail.com> > wrote:
>Matz is Nice -> Matz made Ruby -> Ruby is Red -> Redcloth is Red and
>Ruby -> Redcloth is Nice!-> Matz is Redcloth ?
--
CCD CopyWrite Chad Perrin [ http://ccd.apotheon.org ]
"A script is what you give the actors. A program
is what you give the audience." - Larry Wall
Philip Hallstrom wrote:
As part of their "best Ajax" article:
http://www.ddj.com/dept/architect/192203368?pgno=7
Welcome to the 1980s. Want to make text bold? You'll
have to put the characters * and * around it. For big
text, first type in h1. All that's missing is a DOS
prompt and a floppy disk. No thanks -- been there,
done that.The browser address bar is the DOS prompt. Welcome the the 21st C.
Besides, WYSIWYG is so '90s.I much prefer Writely to Writeboard, but this reviewer so misses the
point it's laughable.(I think the last good issue of Dr. Dobbs was the 30th anniversary one.)
Well now ... I agree with Dr. Dobbs in this case. Give me WYSIWYG or
give me HTML, but don't make me learn a *third* language to mark up text!Didn't you mean to say "don't make me learn a <b>third</b> language to
mark up text" ?
Sorry... I just couldn't help myself
Uh ... yeah. Dang VT100 muscle memory.
Which reminds me ... I need to install a DOS emulator to run some Pascal
code.
Dr. Dobbs is a Doctor -> Doctors fix Matz -> When he's Broken -> RedCloth is
Broken -> Dr. Dobbs is a murderer!!
Can you comprehend THAT??
_why
On Fri, Sep 01, 2006 at 02:03:45AM +0900, Chad Perrin wrote:
On Fri, Sep 01, 2006 at 01:52:44AM +0900, John Johnson wrote:
> On Thu, 31 Aug 2006 12:30:42 -0400, Adam Sanderson <netghost@gmail.com> > > wrote:
>
> >Matz is Nice -> Matz made Ruby -> Ruby is Red -> Redcloth is Red and
> >Ruby -> Redcloth is Nice!
>
> -> Matz is Redcloth ?No . . . but Redcloth is Matz!
M. Edward (Ed) Borasky wrote:
Well now ... I agree with Dr. Dobbs in this case. Give me WYSIWYG or
give me HTML, but don't make me learn a *third* language to mark up text!Didn't you mean to say "don't make me learn a <b>third</b> language to
mark up text" ?
Sorry... I just couldn't help myself
Uh ... yeah. Dang VT100 muscle memory.
PWNED! *cough*
Besides. On which language to program a computer are you now? Or did you stop counting around twenty? Nothing wrong with an alternate approach if it's better. And Textile sure is less (sometimes much less) of a wristkiller than raw HTML. I wonder which smart mind came up with the angle bracket idea, and all the slashes aren't nice on the pinkies either.
I sometimes prefer Markdown or Mediawiki syntax, since Textile headings are ghastly. But Textile's quick CSS modifiers for margins and paragraph indentation are very neat, and on the whole it's a bit richer.
But Dr. Dobbs' point -is- valid, exposing someone to that by default, heck, without a WYSIWYG alternative is just vile - even if it's technically a very good alternative to HTML, it's an annoying We Know What's Good For You Better Than You Do attitude to your users / customers. (Even if I resent the DOS prompt / floppy disk oh-so-witty wisecrack - you're a journalist, just review the damn software without having to invent smartass ways to emphasise its suckiness when you run out of factual observations and leave the dry sarcasm to people that are actually funny.)
David Vallner
why the lucky stiff wrote:
On Fri, Sep 01, 2006 at 02:03:45AM +0900, Chad Perrin wrote:
Dr. Dobbs is a Doctor -> Doctors fix Matz -> When he's Broken -> RedCloth is
Broken -> Dr. Dobbs is a murderer!!Can you comprehend THAT??
I fear the uncertainty of doubt!
--
James Britt
"M. Edward (Ed) Borasky" <znmeb@cesmail.net> writes:
Philip Hallstrom wrote:
As part of their "best Ajax" article:
Review: The Best Ajax-Based Apps | Dr Dobb's
Welcome to the 1980s. Want to make text bold? You'll
have to put the characters * and * around it. For big
text, first type in h1. All that's missing is a DOS
prompt and a floppy disk. No thanks -- been there,
done that.The browser address bar is the DOS prompt. Welcome the the 21st C.
Besides, WYSIWYG is so '90s.I much prefer Writely to Writeboard, but this reviewer so misses the
point it's laughable.(I think the last good issue of Dr. Dobbs was the 30th anniversary one.)
Well now ... I agree with Dr. Dobbs in this case. Give me WYSIWYG or
give me HTML, but don't make me learn a *third* language to mark up text!Didn't you mean to say "don't make me learn a <b>third</b> language to
mark up text" ?
Sorry... I just couldn't help myself
Uh ... yeah. Dang VT100 muscle memory.
Which reminds me ... I need to install a DOS emulator to run some Pascal
code.
But that's just the point of Markdown and Textile! They are trying to
be as much as possible a language that you already know. And you
wrote markup that is valid in both of them not only without having to
think about it, but without even realizing it.
I'm hardly a big advocate of either. My first experience was writing
a comment on some blog, thinking 'some special markup thingy? piffle.'
and just typing away plain text. Then it took my unthinking plain
text and did the right stuff to it. I just think that's kind of neat.
I think the DDJ author was trying to be cute and entertaining. To
restart the ages-old WYSIWYG debate as if it just occurred to him is
weird.
Steve
David Vallner wrote:
But Dr. Dobbs' point -is- valid, exposing someone to that by default, heck, without a WYSIWYG alternative is just vile - even if it's technically a very good alternative to HTML, it's an annoying We Know What's Good For You Better Than You Do attitude to your users / customers.
It seems more like a "We're offering an option for people who prefer Textile to WYSIWYG or hand-coded HTML, since no one is forced to use any of these tools, and choice is good" attitude.
The reviewer missed this same point.
--
James Britt
"Blanket statements are over-rated"
David Vallner wrote:
I sometimes prefer Markdown or Mediawiki syntax, since Textile headings are ghastly. But Textile's quick CSS modifiers for margins and paragraph indentation are very neat, and on the whole it's a bit richer.
FYI, RedCloth 3.x does (some) Markdown too,
http://redhanded.hobix.com/inspect/usingRedcloth3.html
but it's only mentioned in the tag line of,
http://whytheluckystiff.net/ruby/redcloth/
Regards,
--
Bil Kleb
http://fun3d.larc.nasa.gov
James Britt wrote:
why the lucky stiff wrote:
Dr. Dobbs is a Doctor -> Doctors fix Matz -> When he's Broken -> RedCloth is
Broken -> Dr. Dobbs is a murderer!!Can you comprehend THAT??
I fear the uncertainty of doubt!
Badoom-tisch!
David Vallner
On Fri, Sep 01, 2006 at 02:03:45AM +0900, Chad Perrin wrote:
James Britt wrote:
David Vallner wrote:
But Dr. Dobbs' point -is- valid, exposing someone to that by default, heck, without a WYSIWYG alternative is just vile - even if it's technically a very good alternative to HTML, it's an annoying We Know What's Good For You Better Than You Do attitude to your users / customers.
It seems more like a "We're offering an option for people who prefer Textile to WYSIWYG or hand-coded HTML, since no one is forced to use any of these tools, and choice is good" attitude.
The reviewer missed this same point.
Hmm. My phrasing of that was wrong. And probably what I was saying in the first place too... Comparing a rather specialised text-sharing tool to Word-inna-browser ones is indeed nonsense.
David Vallner
I've tried RedCloth, but IIRC it wouldn't let me tell it only process
Markdown (and not Textile markup) so I switched to BlueCloth. I got
the impression that, with RedCloth, Markdown is a bit of a 2nd-class
citizen.
The BlueCloth source looks to be fairly straightforward (maybe a
fairly direct recoding of John Gruber's own Perl version?), is only
one source code file, and is pretty well-commented.
---John
On 8/30/06, Bil Kleb <Bil.Kleb@nasa.gov> wrote:
David Vallner wrote:
>
> I sometimes prefer Markdown or Mediawiki syntax, since Textile headings
> are ghastly. But Textile's quick CSS modifiers for margins and paragraph
> indentation are very neat, and on the whole it's a bit richer.FYI, RedCloth 3.x does (some) Markdown too,
[snip]
James Britt wrote:
David Vallner wrote:
>
> But Dr. Dobbs' point -is- valid, exposing someone to that by default,
> heck, without a WYSIWYG alternative is just vile - even if it's
> technically a very good alternative to HTML, it's an annoying We Know
> What's Good For You Better Than You Do attitude to your users /
> customers.It seems more like a "We're offering an option for people who prefer
Textile to WYSIWYG or hand-coded HTML, since no one is forced to use any
of these tools, and choice is good" attitude.The reviewer missed this same point.
He stated a valid opinion, which you disagreed with and couldn't handle
so you spewed ad hominems and fud like "WYSIWYG is so '90s".
http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.ruby/msg/d8a6759e03c190c8?dmode=source&hl=en