Alternative markup for post entries: Markdown

[tamouse]

Title:
Alternative markup for post entries: Markdown

Area:
entries

Summary:
Allow the use of Markdown to format entries in addition to RTF and HTML.

Description:
While it has been previously suggested in http://dw-suggestions.dreamwidth.org/390894.html?view=3345134 that DW offer a text-based alternative to marking up entries, that suggestion focused on wiki-style markup, and the objections raised (yet another markup to learn, already have RTF, some incompatibilities) are not the same when using Markdown. Markdown is designed to be highly intuitive to pretty much everyone who has used e-mail or irc for past umpteen years. And for those who haven't, there would still be HTML and RTF available.

Markdown is at http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/ . What markdown does is convert the marked up text into HTML.

Markdown co-exists with HTML already, it would likely not have a problem dealing with DW tags in text (i.e., it would leave them alone).

Poll #7555 Alternative markup for post entries: Markdown

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 63

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
14 (22.2%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
1 (1.6%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
21 (33.3%)

(I have no opinion)
25 (39.7%)

(Other: please comment)
2 (3.2%)

Comments

[axiom_of_stripe]

This reminds me strongly of the old archiving software that would convert text to markup as you uploaded stories. Thus, I am saying no on the grounds of "this is too 1999 for me; I have moved on and need no unexpected 3am flashback if I hit the wrong button in the middle of the night," but this is not a strong objection.

[tamouse]

Seriously, markup is used all over that isn't HTML. There are many reasons for this. HTML has been around for quite a long while before 1999 as well; why doesn't it feel outdated as well? Also, the point of this suggestion was to provide a choice, and alternative to using HTML for those who don't want to be bothered with editing it and/or learning it.

[jazzfish]

Yes, but only because I've been looking for a good excuse to learn Markdown. :)

[rho]

To me, this looks like it would have all the problems of wiki-style markup, but without the benefit of a syntax many people will have encountered already.

+1

[silverflight8]

&nsbp;

[tamouse]

the point of Markdown is that it *is* a syntax most people have been already using for years in email, IRC and the like. The objections to an alternative markup seem to be all about people being a) people somehow being forced to use it (not what the suggestion says) and b) somehow it's harder than learning HTML. That you already know HTML is great. I know many languages, including HTML, XHTML and XML/XSLT. However, I don't really want to markup my posts in those, and I imagine a lot of people won't either. I suggested Markdown as an *alternative* (again, an option, a choice, you don't have to use it, etc) because of it's nature as something many folks are already naturally familiar with without necessarily even knowing it.

[rho]

I had a brief look at the Markdown page before commenting, and to me it looked as if it would be fairly intuitive to read, but not terribly intuitive to write. While it does look (at least somewhat) like plain text, there are also a lot of other things which also look like plain text and which aren't Markdown. You still have to get the syntax right, and that means you have to learn and remember it.

I also know you weren't suggesting that this be forced on anyone, but I generally subscribe to the more is less when it comes to adding options school of thought, so I'm thinking in those terms. I just don't think this would be useful to enough people to warrant the drawbacks of adding extra options.

[tamouse]

And here's a telling statement Joel makes in his (quite seminal) work:

"The problem comes when you ask them to make a choice that they don't care about."

and that, I think, pretty much says it all.

[triadruid]

This. I can interpret Markdown as 'some kind of emphasis goes here' when reading, but when writing, I'm buggered if I can recall which is what code for what effect.

But then, I've done HTML since 199mumble...

[msilverstar]

I've used email since about 1988 (and mailings and newsgroups and so on) so some of the Markdown syntax is vaguely familiar to me. And to its advantage, Google+ is currently using the _italic_, *bold*, and -strikeout- conventions.

But the only thing it seems to really bring to the table is quoting for discussions, and I'm not thrilled with the implementation of that.

If there are a bunch of Markdown users who want this, it seems rational to let them write it. Otherwise, a waste of effort.

[tamouse]

I'm not at all sure what you mean by "the only thing it brings to the table is quoting for discussions". Markdown provides a very simple means of marking up text for formatting. It's a hecka lot easier to read the HTML, it's something a lot of people are familiar with (though they may not know it), it's got a lot of support in other places, and it isn't hard to implement given the libraries available for processing Markdown are readily available.

[azurelunatic]

The idea of non-HTML, non-DW-specific-markup doing things to my entries without the ability for me to just have my text displayed as written makes me twitchy.

I would support a "convert this Markdown text to HTML" thing, but if I type some freakin' asterisks, I want to see those asterisks when I post.

[tamouse]

I really do not know where this concept of this being something that will be forced on people comes from. I offered it as an *alternative*, not a *replacement*.

[triadruid]

You're introducing another variable into the system. If we have to 'choose' to use this in the browser, then you have to remember to rechoose it on every machine. If you choose to use it but (like Azz above) WANT to see those asterisks, what do you do? double asterisks works in some implementations, but then you get bold+asterisks, which is really emphatic when I don't mean it to be. Etc, etc, etc...

[tamouse]

I really do not understand why people think this would either be the default or forced on someone without their knowledge. You already have to check a box to get HTML formatting, I don't see why another box for Markdown would be a problem. If you took that to extremes, you could also say the exact same thing for html special characters. I did not *ever* in my original post suggest, nor intend to suggest, that Markdown should be done automatically or by default. I want it to be an *option*, that's all.

There are several comments about people saying they wouldn't use it, which is perfectly fine. But how is that an argument against implementing it? And as for "presenting people with yet another markup language to learn", that's also not really the case here. No one *has* to use it. Just because you happen to know html already doesn't mean every dreamer coming here will know it, or want to learn it. Markdown and similar things exist for a very good reason: it provides a much more readable source for people to type into, and Markdown is rather intuitive for many people (yes, perhaps not YOU).

The suggestion was a text-based *alternative*, not a *replacement*. I do not understand the huge reluctance to give people choices.

[fyreharper]

So, what your suggestion is, is that on the Post page we should have the option "tabs" be Rich Text/HTML/Markdown instead of Rich Text/HTML. Is that correct?

Not sure what you'd want to do about comments though. If I type HTML into this comment, it gets used (see what I did there? HTML! ;) ). There isn't some ticky-box that I have to go ticky to make that happen - in fact, I can't even find an RTF option, it's HTML or nothing. So, either HTML and Markdown would both be used in comments (which would make me really grumpy because when I say *hugs* I want it to print *hugs* not hugs), or only HTML would work in comments and Markdown users would have to remember to enter things differently in their posts vs the comments (or it would display differently for them), or the comments field could... use the most-recently-used Post setting? Although then if someone made a post using something other than their usual setting, it could screw up their comments until they made another post.

Other than that, well, you've already been linked to the "more options are bad UI" post, and that's probably the biggest argument against.
If it were something a lot of people currently use/actively want to be able to use here, then it could well make sense to implement it anyway, but I haven't seen that argument yet. I guess, the argument-in-favor I'm seeing presented isn't "there's a lot of demand for being able to use Markdown", but instead "Markdown is intuitive/easy to learn". But perhaps I'm way off base on how much demand there is for a text-based markup option :)

[tamouse]

Re: tabs: yes, exactly

Re: comments: yes, that is problematic; same problem people have for RTF. I would not propose a modal format based on the last used post format.

Re: so, there must have been a huge demand for RTF posting? How did that come about? Markdown is used extensively in many other blogging and journaling platforms. As for determining need or desire, I suggest it be done a bit more scientifically than "I haven't heard of any".

For example, Amazon does a hella lot of instrumentation of their UI to determine which changes users like and use and which ones they ignore. They don't rely just on some people's speculations about whether something is useful or good or not; they judge based on how people interact with the UI. The concept of "more options are bad, mkay?" is fine up to a point -- it's based on theoretical concepts about what people use getting around a web site. These are fine ideas, and I subscribe to them as well. But in the face of data, many theories fall.

There's also the well-known phenomenon that people don't know what they want until they're given the option to have it. That, in fact, is pretty much the entire basis for the level of innovation and use that the Internet has brought us. Who knew they wanted online journaling and sharing with friends until LJ came along?

[matgb]

Re comments, specifically, I think there's an argument for trying to bring an RTF interface in for them as well, in which case having MD as well wouldn't be a problem. But unless we implement a switching interface, I don't think it should be there for comments.

I do think that it's possible to take the 'too many options' dislike too far--if an option genuinely adds something to the experience, isn't confusing and works intuitively it can be good.

I can see it being nice and easy, and it isn't even an 'option' in the traditional sense, the update page remembers your last used choice anyway, so most people wouldn't notice it was there unless they want to use it, etc.

[tamouse]

Here's the main issue I have with writing posts with HTML markup: it's unnatural to the writing process. If I have to think about how to create the markup with HTML, then that detracts from my writing process. To me, at least, getting the content down in post is the most important thing and having to add HTML markup (or most wiki markup for that matter) means I have to switch trains of thought from what I'm writing to how I want to display that writing.

[triadruid]

I could write that same sentence, from the perspective of someone who writes HTML instinctively. Markdown is weird to me, *because I'm not used to it*.

[tamouse]

I am extremely curious why you think I'm trying to convert you to using Markdown?

[tamouse]

By your logic, since I'm very familiar and intuitively use Markdown, then shouldn't I be allowed to use it?

[triadruid]

Because it's not about YOU. It's about how the site as a whole deals with the input and output. Adding a third/fourth/fifth way of encoding posts makes things MUCH more complicated (way more than 33%).

[tamouse]

Right, it's not about ME, neither is it about YOU, yet all your arguments are based on that. How HTML is easier for YOU. How YOU don't want to learn a different markup. The assumption that because HTML is easy for YOU it must be easy for EVERYONE and that NO ONE else besides ME would want to use Markdown is just a fallacy.

Adding a new encoding facility wouldn't add anywhere near 33% complication to the site. The site has a lot of things that have absolutely nothing to do with translating markup.

But apparently DW is not ready to welcome people who aren't web authors.

[matgb]

apparently DW is not ready to welcome people who aren't web authors.

Think you're stretching far too much there. Several people have spoken in favour of this, including me-I even went and did some digging on other formats-a partial point against, FWIW, is that G+ is using similar markup for completely different results.

Generally, this comm will have people pull an idea to pieces to see if it's good or not, some of the best actually implemented ideas came out of a lot of discussion and critique in the comments.

SRSLY, I think this is a good idea, but you're going to annoy people if you let your frustration get to you in the way YOU just did (not everyone reads or intends for ALL CAPS to be read as shouting and annoyance, but most will, and it does look offputting).

(and it would add 33% complexity to the user interface of the single most important page on the site, which is an issue that needs to be addressed, poor UI can kill even the best idea ever, the Update Page is already difficult and in the middle of a massive redesign, adding an extra input choice to it, with a UI to let people switch, isn't going to be spectacularly easy, that's something we'd need to think about)

[denise]

Please remember, the opinions of people in dw_suggestions are not the opinions of DW staff or the position of DW itself, unless it comes from someone with the swirly-D hugging their userhead icon (indicating an official staff account)!

I know the process of having people debate an idea of yours can be very stressful, and it's very easy to want to aggressively defend your idea, but you aren't trying to convince the readers of dw_suggestions with your suggestion; you're trying to convince me, since I'm the one who makes the final decisions. Every suggestion has to be weighed very carefully -- any time there's anything involving adding another option, especially if it would conflict with the existing ways people use the site (for instance, as others have observed, wanting to preserve their *asterisks* and not have them interpreted) we have to see whether the utility of the new option outweighs the negatives of adding the option (as more options are generally bad UI).

This doesn't mean that a suggestion for adding a new option is going to be rejected out of hand; it means that we have to think about it carefully. As matgb noted, we are in the middle of redesigning the update page, and updating in general is the absolute core functionality of the site -- everything else exists to support it. So, any suggestion to change the way things work will receive a great deal of scrutiny, and people will try to tease out all the potential problems with an updating-related suggestion because of that.

I'm sorry you've been made to feel like you have nothing to contribute! It absolutely isn't true; we listen to every suggestion that's offered to us, and we consider all the arguments made both for and against a suggestion when we decide whether or not to advance it to Bugzilla for future implementation. The discussion in dw-suggestions often gets passionate, because many users care about Dreamwidth greatly and want to do what's best for Dreamwidth. Someone bringing up downsides to any suggestion isn't trying to attack the person who's suggesting it; they're trying to help brainstorm all the things that could go wrong with the suggestion, to see if working together, people can find a solution.

[triadruid]

I...didn't say you were? I'm saying your experience is that Markdown is untuitive and HTML is hard. I'm saying it's exactly the opposite for me.

[octothorpe]

I'm voting for, but with changes. Multimarkdown is an arguably more 'modern' fork, with some additional capabilities

The fork is located here:
http://fletcherpenney.net/multimarkdown/

[matgb]

Disagree, it may be a good fork, but keeping to a standard would be better-Tumblr supports Markdown, it would be interesting to see how heavily used it is.

I have changed my vote from 'no opinion' to implement as is, as if it's being used by a site as big as Tumblr it's worht considering, but think we should keep to the same standard as other sites are using.

[octothorpe]

Did you read the MM docs? It's the exact same syntax, plus some additional. In fact, most markdown implementations are in fact MM. Ask the Tumblr folks which one they implemented (I don't know, I'm curious myself).