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this a first draft of a not-so-deeply-explored idea -- spir
feel free to correct & clarify my weird english ;-)



markup customization : an alternative to syntax standard ?
or
syntax standard /versus/ file format 

extended customization#

We are used to contexts where the user interface is disconnected from the 'real' document through a personalisation layer. For instance, an editor allows to set the indent width, whatever you or the author typed, and the save format for indentation (tab or n spaces), whatever you typed. This creates a kind of disconnection of foreground & background, for display as well as for input. One can set what to type (e.g. TAB) for a specific token and/or meaning (indent) ; and conversely how a specific token should be displayed.

This principle may be extended to allow a real customization of any computer language. For instance, I would set that an assignment should be written ':' rather than '='. This is what I would see and type in the editor. Still the assignment is saved in file as "=" or any other standard token. Note that this method allows for keyword changes as well, including an internationalisation of the whole programming language. I also would change "print" (!) to "write", "écrire", "escriure" or "schreiben".

Most important, as the saved version is standard, any user or programmer who opens a file written by someone else would read it as expected : that is either according to the standard norm, or to his/her own customized one -- not according to the author's preferences, whatever they may be. The editor simply replaces standard tokens of the file by tags, signs or keywords defined in a local parameter file. The editor simply search-and-replaces standard tokens by the ones set in a local parameter file. Only when the syntax, not only the lexicon, is changed, then the problem becomes much more difficult and requires real parsing. Or do I misunderstand the point ?

application to wikitext#

Could we do that for wikitext/wikiCreole? Instead of (or together with) promoting a standard source text markup, we may promote a background file saving format. Then, however the text has been typed, it will be saved in a standard form which allows any other form for display, as well as for edition. We may use any kind of format for saving. It may even be identical to the present or future wikiCreole markup (once made slightly more consistent, see http://www.riehle.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/a4-junghans.pdf). It may also be more formal, using for instance unique tokens in order to ease and speed up the rendering process. It may also be directly transcoded to x/html.

see also STIF @ Semantic Web : project toward a file exchange format -- but customization not adressed

can it be (easily) implemented ?#

If ever this idea sounds not only romantic to your ears, please help and improve this section, particuliarly, as I haven't ever done such a job. Here is how thez pb looks to my eyes after a brief exploration :

case of wikitext on a remote server Not only an encoding/decoding extension is needed for the editor, but there may be several syntax variants, and also the parameters have to be saved somewhere.
There may be be several norms for a user to choose when about to edit :

  • the site's own dialect
  • standard Creole
  • a local Creole variant (e.g. using tokens closer to the local dialect)
  • the user's own preferred norm
The three first cases lie at the site level. About the last one, a preference file could be uploaded ; or, if the user is a registered member of the wiki, it may be stored together with his/her profile. Anyway, it's at most a few hundred bytes of plain text.

Then remains the question of encoding and decoding from/to the saving format. The specification itself is the job of the people who promote a standard, but delivering tools to help complying with it helps much : a parser. Still, if the format is clear & coherent, its parsing will be highly easier. This is especially true, I guess, if the saving format specifies only semantic classes.

using only semantics#

Some of the people who promote text structuring markup standards (not only for wiki) express the opinion that such a language should only specify the semantics of the structure. To do this, not only the language specification must avoid using words who evoke styles ("bold"), but the html transcoding must not specify any concrete styling (<b>).

This requirement is achieved by specifying only semantic classes instead, whose names or IDs can be clear, unambiguous and functional. For instance :

  • "litteral_block_of_text" (nowiki, unprocessed)
  • "important_segment_of_text" (or simply "highlighted", but better avoid x/html vocabulary)
  • "link_or_pointer_target" (= anchor, note or reference)

The above examples don't pretend to be good... ;-) Just for lauching your imagination. Still it should be /much/ easier to reach an agreement on such formal and background Ids than on foreground tags ! End of the tag war...

Such IDs may be encoded directly in real x/html. Anyway, the purpose is only to indicate text types for which styles would be defined separately. Or we could use any other encoding, such as :

Still it should be <segment_style : distinct_text>much</segment_style : distinct_text> easier to reach an agreement...

relation to "native" dialect#

I was really surprised when I read about the possible mixed-mode of implementation for letting wikiCreole coexist with a local wiki dialect. First I thought that, how well designed wikiCreole may be, there would be tag conflicts. Then that the right way should be edit-Creole-mode. Anyway, as soon as there is a file format standard, instead of an markup standard, this problem simply disappears. Or am I wrong ?

This would allow wikiCreole to cover most of the needs in wikiText, instead of only a minimum set of common features. Moreover, the standard should rather cover as much as possible, so that when it is used instead of the local dialect, only few remaining, wiki-specific, features can't be expressed using Creole. This point can also be adressed through customization, due to the ExtensibleByOmission principle.

customization cascade#

Such a method opens possibilities of customization at several levels, each one beeing imo a great advantage. So that, analog to cascading style sheets, there may be cascading markup customization :

  • level 0 : creole standard
simply a base
  • level 1 : internationalisation
Allows to choose alternative tags for a better adaptation to various cultures (e.g. "#" as number sign is cultural) ; but also to use keywords, as they would then be translatable : keywords for internationalisation.
  • level 2 : wiki engine level
Adaptation to the engine's own dialect, so the authors used to it can also write in Creole more naturally. For instance set '__' for bold or '-' for a list item.
  • level 3 : site level
This level allows customization to any local variant, especially to topic-specific formatting needs. This can be done using an extension syntax -- particuliarly useful for additional inline elements or block components.
  • level 4 : user preferences
For any weird reason, users always find defaults in any standard, have their own opinion on anything, want to change things that proved to be good...

pros#

write down

cons#

idem

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« This page (revision-5) was last changed on 20-Sep-2008 19:07 by spir