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> To dramatically reduce ambiguities, we can remove the doubled character delimiters for strong emphasis. Instead, use a single _ for regular emphasis, and a si
by egypturnash 3y ago
> To dramatically reduce ambiguities, we can remove the doubled character delimiters for strong emphasis. Instead, use a single _ for regular emphasis, and a single * for strong emphasis.
I would love to see * gone but I must note that _ is annoyingly hard to type on a screen keyboard.
Back in the days of USENET one common choice was using a / to delimit /emphasis/ - the usual reading was that this indicated words that would normally be rendered as /italics/. You'd often see it used to indicate the titles of books and movies, as well, since the typographical convention was typically that these were italicized as well - note that both <em> and <cite> typically render as italics, for instance. I have always disliked Markdown's choice to use * as a delimiter for both italics and bold; / always implied italics to me, and * always implied bold.
Anyway. I propose that / would be a much better delimiter for emphasis than _. On a US keyboard, it can be typed without a shift key. And on a US IOS screen keyboard, it is a simple swipe on B, versus shifting to the numeric entry page and swiping on &.
- ajdude 3y agoI agree. I admit, I still /do this/ for emphasis, and have always wondered why Markdown didn't follow suit.
- masklinn 3y agoBecause Gruber used a different convention? > While Markdown’s syntax has been influenced by several existing text-to-HTML filters — including Setext, atx, Textile, reStructuredText, Grutatext, and EtText — the single biggest source of inspiration for Markdown’s syntax is the format of plain text email.
- loloquwowndueo 3y agoDo you have some reference for “simple swipe on B”? Doesn’t work for me (not that simple I guess?)
- bobbylarrybobby 3y agoThey're probably referring to the iPad keyboard (https://www.ghacks.net/2019/08/02/how-to-enable-the-swipe-keyboard-in-ipados/ https://www.ghacks.net/2019/08/02/how-to-enable-the-swipe-ke...)
- hsfzxjy 3y agoWhy would a _ be harder to type than a * on a screen keyboard?
- ilyt 3y agosame difficulty on mine, just switch into alternate character page and both need no shifting or button holding there, no idea what he's on about.
- jitl 3y agoBut I like to write paths like /usr/bin/ in my text and don’t want to worry about backtick code quoting them every time
- SoftTalker 3y agoMost people don't write file paths. Only a concern for programmers, who should be fine escaping them by whatever mechanism.
- doubleunplussed 3y agoAnd in markdown you chuck them between backticks to indicate they're verbatim text to be rendered in monospace.
- blooalien 3y ago> "And in markdown you chuck them between backticks to indicate they're verbatim text to be rendered in monospace." Only if the intent is for the URL to be copy/pasted, otherwise you enclose the URL in <url> or [text](url) to make it clickable.
- mort96 3y agoMost markdown implementations make URLs clickable without the angle brackets.
- dyarosla 3y agoUh.. what about all those non programmers that write URLs?
- jitl 3y agoMost people don’t write markdown! What’s the demographic of markdown writers who don’t write file paths? Bloggers?
- melagonster 3y ago
- qingcharles 3y agoI really like your proposal, but in the days of USENET the // wasn't interpreted by the machine but simply by our minds, just like * for bold. Would there be any extra issues caused by italics being / rather than *? I'm honestly with you on this and I'm in the middle of building a huge Markdown site where I have the freedom to change the syntax now if I want.
- SoftTalker 3y agoI'd like to see *this is bold* /this is italics/ _this is underlined_ Beyond simple conventions like this, I'd just as soon drop into HTML as deal with some other markup that ends up being just as complex. We don't need to allow permutations and combinations such as bold and italics, double-weight bold, etc. these never occur in normal prose typesetting and if you need it just use HTML for those rare cases.
- defrost 3y agoAs a point of order; \* more than 3\/4's of people may not feel that way, particularly those discussing snake\_case Vs CamelCase
- CrimsonChapulin 3y agoThat’s PascalCase, camelCase does not capitalize the first word.
- arcanemachiner 3y agoTurns out that it's a contentious topic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camel_case https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camel_case FWIW I use the same nomenclature as you, but that doesn't make it universal.
- overhead4075 3y agoNew rule needs ~ when * or _ is used inside words, so your example wouldn't need escaping. E.g., dis~/cuss/~ing
- cbarrick 3y agoIn IPA, slashes are used for abstract phonemic notation ( pronunciation guides). Converting that to <em> would be annoying for certain communities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Phonetic_Alphabet#Brackets_and_transcription_delimiters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Phonetic_Alphabe...
- dredmorbius 3y agoThere's the concept of escaping notation using a single backslash: \ So: **strong text** -> bold "strong text" \*\*doubled splats\*\* -> "doubled splats" w/ "**" on either side This is also cumbersome to type, but at least there's a path to what you want to present even if the character is reserved for markup.
- cbarrick 3y agoYes. I'm less concerned about it being cumbersome to write than I am about it being cumbersome to read. And again, this complaint will only be relevant in contexts where this specific convention is used.
- ilyt 3y agorare enough to not matter
- toastal 3y agoUsage of `_` and `-` keys are dead simple home-row keys on Dvorak keyboards. I’ve never switched layouts because most are focused on prose, but programming demands a lot of snake & kebab casing. …not that `/` is too far away.
- ilyt 3y ago> Back in the days of USENET one common choice was using a / to delimit /emphasis/ - the usual reading was that this indicated words that would normally be rendered as /italics/. Fuck no. Same idiocy as turning -- into long em, makes writing any technical posts mighty annoying Get better screen keyboard. On mine _ doesn't require shift, neither does *