Twitter Style User Addressing

[zorkian]

Title:
Twitter Style User Addressing

Area:
html formatting

Summary:
It would be convenient and fairly typical of the modern Internet to be able to refer to accounts using a nice shorthand. I propose using the Twitter style: @mark would be the equivalent of <user name="mark">.

Description:
Writing HTML isn't something that comes naturally to many people. Twitter's style of addressing has been used for many years in email (they certainly didn't make it up) and is now gaining broad acceptance as a modern way of referring to other user accounts.

Given that, I think that it would be awesome to type @denise and have it show up as if I had typed <user name="denise">.

Furthermore, I think that it would be great to be able to easily refer to other people on other domains. For example, I think @news.lj would be easier to type than <user name="news" site="livejournal.com">. Even if we had to type @news.livejournal.com that's a lot easier to type than remembering the HTML and exactly what to put in it.

Poll #2493 Twitter Style User Addressing

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 163

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
66 (40.5%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
22 (13.5%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
57 (35.0%)

(I have no opinion)
14 (8.6%)

(Other: please comment)
4 (2.5%)

Comments

[whatdoyousee]

As a coder, I have to have closing tags - makes it so easy to see where I've screwed up!

Oh, this so much. Sure, I stick to the basics (hello, missing quotation marks), but trying to find a tiny mistake in a WALLOFTEXT all night long... Been there, done that, and I really don't wanna know what it would be like without closing tags. Personally, I'd throw myself out the next window *snrk* Really, your suggestion's the best I've seen here.

Exactly! That's one thing I don't like about Twitter - it's hard to know if there talking to the person or about them :/

IKR! The link looks nice (an icon would just break the flow), but the @ is so damn confusing. And people actually chat there? It boggles the mind...

[auroraprimavera]

LOL! No throwing yourself out a window! Egads, that's messy. *g*

When I worked as a web/graphic designer I would literally spend hours scouring through one page trying to fin what happened with the code and why it wasn't working right. It's amazing how one single missed closing tag can really screw things up.

I've done it before, the chatting thing - which, I get. I've actually done it with like ten people at once. That got confusing real quick! But, I hate when I see someone mentioned and I don't know if they're replying or what. Though I did find a great Greasmonkey script that shows replies on Twitter as nested - that makes it a heck of a lot easier.

[auroraprimavera]

ACK *Greasemonkey - I hate not being able to edit :p

[whatdoyousee]

lawl. That's okay. It's just a backyard no one ever uses (no collateral damage!). hurr

It really is. Whether a code is correct or not, the result is just fascinating (if a little frustrating sometimes). A closing tag is such a little thing, except not really! Why would they want to get rid of the HTML... *sadface*

Ten people at once!? *jaw drops* Holy moly... Seems like (general-)you have to use Twitter regularly to not get confused (only to boggle at the HTML other sites use). Language barrier, online-style? IDK... I don't even know how to post a new tweet, I just follow people, so. haha