From: Paul Lutus Date: 2006-11-25T08:15:06+09:00 Subject: Re: RedCloth issues Louis J Scoras wrote: / ... >> Not surprisingly, given this baroquely complex series of filters and >> layers: >> >> > ... I came >> > across a few unexpected features... > > Sheesh. What's with the unabashed library hating lately? =) I don't actually hate the idea of using a library. I just feel bad for people who choose the wrong library, or who haven't considered any other way to solve a problem. > He stated his problem adequately. He wanted something like this: > >

Double the value of 'a'.

> 
a*=2
>

also double 'b'

> 
b*=2
> > and got something like this, > >

Double the value of 'a'. a =2 also double 'b' b 2

> > instead. And he can't figure out why, and I can. So I explained it. > >> I would have been surprised if you had _not_ encountered such >> inconsistencies or "features" in such a complex scheme. >> >> So again, please say what the disease is, not the remedy. Let's try to >> work from there. > > He needs textile to be rendered correctly. That IS the problem. No the problem is his having chosen RedCloth to try to solve a Textile problem, which was originally meant to solve an HTML problem, which was originally meant to solve a general markup problem. / ... >> The only bug I see is the sheer complexity of the overall scheme. > > No, the concept is actually rather simple. I'll say -- there is no chance that this elaborate, multilayered scheme will work. That part is very simple. > It's a minimal markup > language that exists because typing html by hand sucks. And this represents the ultimate solution to the drudgery of writing HTML by hand. First, someone (now justly famous) wrote HTML to solve the problem that most markup languages were too hard to use. Then someone wrote Textile because HTML was too hard to use. Then someone wrote RedCloth because Textile was too hard to use. And during this process, no one bothered to ask what the point was, or whether the process of layering would eventually get to a point where the entire scheme would collapse, and people would be reduced to writing simple solutions to simple problems. -- Paul Lutus http://www.arachnoid.com