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Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

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Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#101

Post by arboles »

adityaathalye wrote: post #85
arboles wrote: post #12

Does Org have a mechanism for escaping its own syntax? Last time I searched, to type *this* (keeping the asterisks) you had to insert a zero-width space (U+200B). In markdown you just escape them with \*this\*.

Yeah escaping can be annoying. I've used the following, in addition to the "escape character" method (which is officially documented as the other commenter noted): For in-line escaping, I use tilde-blocks ~ ~ ... as in ~ ~ . This type-sets in monospace (code format) in exports, which usually* is what one wants anyway, viz. to demarcate the symbol as being symbolised. For non-code text blocks, "Literal Example" https:…

This summary is definitely useful as I'm myself a user of Org. I still think backslash escaping doesn't get to be annoying, and is a simple algorithm, which is important when you want to paste text into your org documents from other sources.

You can keep these tricks in mind while writing, but sometimes it's not you doing the writing. It could be pasted text, it could be a machine writing.

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#102

Post by bitwize »

jrm4 wrote: post #56
jameshart wrote: post #13

Sure. And driving on the left is one of the most reasonable sides of the road to drive on, but in a country where everyone drives on the right, it’s good to accept that, though driving on the left offers just as many advantages, nonetheless you shouldn’t insist on continuing to do so. Markdown is also one of the most reasonable markup languages to use for text, and it has won sufficient share that it should be your d…

This is advice that I would have rolled with pre-Generative AI. Today, I'm not so sure. I'm actually way used to zim-wiki syntax because that's what I started off with; and already "moving it around" is becoming orders of magnitude easier given the ability to vibe-code tons of little scripts that make it work better with everything else -- and while this might seem a bit counter to the point -- I think one can reason…

> This is advice that I would have rolled with pre-Generative AI.

/me laughs in pandoc

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#103

Post by creata »

beej71 wrote: post #84

I use Markdown for all my books, currently. It used to be a custom XML format, but that was really annoying to type even with custom Vim keybindings. I do wish Markdown were more capable, but it's a good lowest common denominator for HTML and PDF. Also Pandoc-flavored markdown is pretty decent. My current flow is: Markdown -> preprocess -> pandoc -> HTML Markdown -> preprocess -> pandoc -> HTML -> page-splitter -> sp…

> I'm hoping to replace it with Typst

This might be stupid but is there a reason you want to go through docbook and xsltproc instead of setting --pdf-engine=typst?

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#104

Post by skeledrew »

leobg wrote: post #53
skeledrew wrote: post #17

I discovered and started using org-mode (and, as a result, Emacs) when I migrated from Evernote in '16. Today I use it for all my project, task and knowledge management needs, with some files going over 15MB in size. And I'm still loving it. Started out with headers only, and every time I wanted something more, it was always just there for the taking. Easy to use, and also crazy powerful. Can't think of anything else…

How do you handle PDFs, images, HTML/rich text snippets? Asking because Evernote supported all of those. It’s what keeps me using that app, even though I cringe every time I open it.

I've never used anything but plain text in org TBH. I know there are tools out there that make it possible/easy to work with certain binary files, but I've just never had such a use case. At most I'll put a link to a given file that opens it in a native viewer.

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#106

Post by creata »

itmitica wrote: post #105

Question: why is ` https://orgmode.org/ ` in html and not in ... org mode?

Looking at the markup of some pages, such as https://orgmode.org/Changes.html , at least parts of the website seem to have been generated from Org mode.

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#107

Post by Groxx »

jackcviers3 wrote: post #94
Groxx wrote: post #43

AFAICT org-mode has no spec. Still. Decades later. The only spec is a single implementation. Which is probably why approximately nothing else supports it. CommonMark on the other hand is very widely supported and all of them work great together. I'll stick to CommonMark.

Isn't that true of python as well? I would argue that Github's decision to use markdown for formatting, more than any other, is what resulted in its widespread adoption to other use cases. The simple tool to share code ate the world. I'm continually surprised that Microsoft hasn't completely cornered the market on LLM code generation, given their head start with copilot and ready access to source code on a scale that…

Python has a spec and multiple healthy implementations, and is overwhelmingly more popular than org mode, so I don't really think that's a rebuttal.

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#108

Post by IshKebab »

Hmm with the way people go on about it I always assumed there was more to Org mode than "Markdown for Emacs", but this post makes it sound exactly like that.

He's also not exactly gaining credibility with "Markdown is useless because it's not standardised; there are lots of slightly different implementations"... Well yeah that's mildly annoying but it's still very useful! And then he completely throws away all credibility with "this isn't a problem with Org mode because Emacs is the only implementation!".

Can anyone tell me an actual reason to use Org mode over Markdown?

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#109

Post by jameshart »

fipar wrote: post #46
jameshart wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For personal workflows, yes. In your own backyard, you decide what side of the road you drive on. But when building a product for other people to use - a messaging tool like slack or a commenting platform like GitHub code review…?

What if you're building a product for other people like you to use? I think this is very common, like people building tools for trackers vs Ableton/Live/etc style DAWs, or those writing software only targeting the OS they use? Not every product is built with the goal of worldwide adoption. Back to the specific case being discussed, I can easily export usable markdown from org. The people I share it with have never no…

There are whole countries that drive on the left

Re: Org Mode syntax is one of the most reasonable markup languages for text (2017)

#110

Post by sorrythanks »

jameshart wrote: post #13

Sure. And driving on the left is one of the most reasonable sides of the road to drive on, but in a country where everyone drives on the right, it’s good to accept that, though driving on the left offers just as many advantages, nonetheless you shouldn’t insist on continuing to do so. Markdown is also one of the most reasonable markup languages to use for text, and it has won sufficient share that it should be your d…

this is so true. i wrote a document in org and i'm still in the hospital after crashing into someone's markdown file
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