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MDN converted to Markdown

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Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#41

Post by mumumu »

nerdponx wrote: post #6

It's too bad that AsciiDoc still hasn't really caught on like Markdown. It's a whole lot nicer for more-complicated documents. I understand their reasons for not using it here, but it still seems like a perfect fit for this task. Eclipse still seems to be working on a formal spec, but hopefully that will help implementations to grow and adoption to increase. In any case, avoiding raw HTML is a huge improvement. I lik…

Linux considered AsciiDoc. But went with ReStructuredText. So, I'd look into that instead.

I'd guess Mozilla chosen a format most people are familiar with.

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#42

Post by Lvl999Noob »

swyx wrote: post #8
nerdponx wrote: post #6

It's too bad that AsciiDoc still hasn't really caught on like Markdown. It's a whole lot nicer for more-complicated documents. I understand their reasons for not using it here, but it still seems like a perfect fit for this task. Eclipse still seems to be working on a formal spec, but hopefully that will help implementations to grow and adoption to increase. In any case, avoiding raw HTML is a huge improvement. I lik…

Markdown is "worse is better". AsciiDoc is more powerful, but has a steeper learning curve, therefore it lost. tale as old as tech. EDIT: i'm compiling a list of "Worse is Better" technology battles: - Mixed paradigm languages vs Functional languages - Typescript vs Flow - React+Redux beat Angular and Elm - VHS beat Betamax - AC beat DC - what else? please share more here https://hashnode.com/preview/636602dec7fec996…

Isn't typescript better than flow? In what ways is flow better?

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#43

Post by andylynch »

smashed wrote: post #19
nerdponx wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> has a steeper learning curve Does it? I think Markdown "won" for a variety of reasons (Github? Slack? Pandoc?). I don't think AsciiDoc is so much more complicated than Markdown that people can't learn it quickly. The reason Markdown is now standard is that people like standardized things. They want to use the same syntax in their chatroom, forum, ad-hoc readme filed, and doc comments in code. And if they're already…

I think you are on the right track but may be over estimating the "average" internet user capabilities? I had to migrate a couple of projects from awful, big ridden, wysiwyg editors to markdown and it's a huge challenge. Many people expect everything to work just as Ms Office/word does. Anything behaving in any way different than their benchmark is wrong.. Now, going from such a mindset to Markdown is a huge endeavou…

I really don’t get the push for markdown etc over WYSIWYG for everyday people. The _very first_ web browser was also an GUI editor, and then you already had proper rich text editors since at least the Macintosh. Why should users not expect something as basic as formatting text to follow UI conventions established through what’s now forty-odd years of use by billions or people? It is akin to asking them not to complain when swapping a steering wheel for something like the tiller on 1880s cars.

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#44

Post by Lvl999Noob »

enriquto wrote: post #37
nerdponx wrote: post #6

It's too bad that AsciiDoc still hasn't really caught on like Markdown. It's a whole lot nicer for more-complicated documents. I understand their reasons for not using it here, but it still seems like a perfect fit for this task. Eclipse still seems to be working on a formal spec, but hopefully that will help implementations to grow and adoption to increase. In any case, avoiding raw HTML is a huge improvement. I lik…

> In any case, avoiding raw HTML is a huge improvement. Why is that? Raw HTML is quite simple to understand and edit. Especially modern html5. There may be a slightly marginal improvement with bold markings with stars versus b tags, but I wouldn't call it "huge" by any means. EDIT: of course, you can build nightmares with plain HTML. Especially when it is auto-generated. But hand-written simple HTML is essentially eq…

One example was given in the article itself. Raw HTML requires escaping html tags. This leads to completely inlegible code that would be impossible for someone to review without rendering the page and checking the output.

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#45

Post by silvestrov »

iamtedd wrote: post #35
swyx wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Markdown is "worse is better". AsciiDoc is more powerful, but has a steeper learning curve, therefore it lost. tale as old as tech. EDIT: i'm compiling a list of "Worse is Better" technology battles: - Mixed paradigm languages vs Functional languages - Typescript vs Flow - React+Redux beat Angular and Elm - VHS beat Betamax - AC beat DC - what else? please share more here https://hashnode.com/preview/636602dec7fec996…

In what way is DC better than AC? To my knowledge AC rightfully won - much easier to transport over long distances, whereas DC required a generator nearly on every city block (among other reasons).

From Wikipedia:

> High-voltage direct current (HVDC) is used to transmit large amounts of power over long distances or for interconnections between asynchronous grids. When electrical energy is to be transmitted over very long distances, the power lost in AC transmission becomes appreciable and it is less expensive to use direct current instead of alternating current. For a very long transmission line, these lower losses (and reduced construction cost of a DC line) can offset the additional cost of the required converter stations at each end.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_power_transmission#Hi...

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#46

Post by xigoi »

keybored wrote: post #40
kubanczyk wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity I've looked up "asciidoc tutorial". 10% into the first page and I see this: A [.myrole]#custom role# must be fulfilled by the theme. Wait, is this in example 7 of 97? That's already... disturbing? But I scroll just a little down and I see examples 11 and 12: https://chat.asciidoc.org[Discuss AsciiDoc,role=external,window=_blank] CAUTION If the link text contains a comma and the text is followed by on…

Having to use quotes (or any other symbol) sometimes based on learned rules is a big no-no for lightweight markup in my book.

In Markdown, you sometimes have to put a backslash before special characters.

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#47

Post by pletnes »

iamtedd wrote: post #35
swyx wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Markdown is "worse is better". AsciiDoc is more powerful, but has a steeper learning curve, therefore it lost. tale as old as tech. EDIT: i'm compiling a list of "Worse is Better" technology battles: - Mixed paradigm languages vs Functional languages - Typescript vs Flow - React+Redux beat Angular and Elm - VHS beat Betamax - AC beat DC - what else? please share more here https://hashnode.com/preview/636602dec7fec996…

In what way is DC better than AC? To my knowledge AC rightfully won - much easier to transport over long distances, whereas DC required a generator nearly on every city block (among other reasons).

AC voltage can be changed up/down cheaply by making a couple of (relatively) simple wire coils. Also AC engines are simple, compact and reliable. Recall that the choice of AC was also taken over 100 years ago, before any electronics were around.

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#48

Post by enriquto »

Lvl999Noob wrote: post #44
enriquto wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In any case, avoiding raw HTML is a huge improvement. Why is that? Raw HTML is quite simple to understand and edit. Especially modern html5. There may be a slightly marginal improvement with bold markings with stars versus b tags, but I wouldn't call it "huge" by any means. EDIT: of course, you can build nightmares with plain HTML. Especially when it is auto-generated. But hand-written simple HTML is essentially eq…

One example was given in the article itself. Raw HTML requires escaping html tags. This leads to completely inlegible code that would be impossible for someone to review without rendering the page and checking the output.

The xmp tag would be the natural answer to this problem. It still works in browsers, but unfortunately it became deprecated on the html5 standard. A hackish (thus beautiful!) answer is to use textarea tags, suitably styled.

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#49

Post by xigoi »

nerdponx wrote: post #12
swyx wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Markdown is "worse is better". AsciiDoc is more powerful, but has a steeper learning curve, therefore it lost. tale as old as tech. EDIT: i'm compiling a list of "Worse is Better" technology battles: - Mixed paradigm languages vs Functional languages - Typescript vs Flow - React+Redux beat Angular and Elm - VHS beat Betamax - AC beat DC - what else? please share more here https://hashnode.com/preview/636602dec7fec996…

> has a steeper learning curve Does it? I think Markdown "won" for a variety of reasons (Github? Slack? Pandoc?). I don't think AsciiDoc is so much more complicated than Markdown that people can't learn it quickly. The reason Markdown is now standard is that people like standardized things. They want to use the same syntax in their chatroom, forum, ad-hoc readme filed, and doc comments in code. And if they're already…

> The reason Markdown is now standard is that people like standardized things.

Can you think of anything less standardized than Markdown?

Re: MDN converted to Markdown

#50

Post by 0xfffafaCrash »

Lvl999Noob wrote: post #42
swyx wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Markdown is "worse is better". AsciiDoc is more powerful, but has a steeper learning curve, therefore it lost. tale as old as tech. EDIT: i'm compiling a list of "Worse is Better" technology battles: - Mixed paradigm languages vs Functional languages - Typescript vs Flow - React+Redux beat Angular and Elm - VHS beat Betamax - AC beat DC - what else? please share more here https://hashnode.com/preview/636602dec7fec996…

Isn't typescript better than flow? In what ways is flow better?

Yeah, TS isn’t just better than Flow. It’s vastly better in almost any way one can think of.

One of the few cases where the answer isn’t even “it depends.” I have to imagine swyx is either trolling here or has some very special contrarian opinion to almost anyone who has used these two technologies.

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