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I’m not entirely sure why there’s a push toward ASCII diagrams (perhaps influenced by AI usage). Mermaid and PlantUML are already text-based representations, an

I’m not entirely sure why there’s a push toward ASCII diagrams (perhaps influenced by AI usage). Mermaid and PlantUML are already text-based representations, and what most users actually want is a rendered diagram in a standard, widely recognized notation—primarily for humans, not machines. ASCII diagrams are inherently constrained by printable characters, which makes them hard to standardize and limits their expressiveness compared to proper diagram renderers.

gregoriol 9mo ago
You can put ASCII diagrams in code comments. Also Claude code in the terminal can show them.
- deleted 9mo ago
  [deleted]
tuetuopay 9mo ago
They don't need a renderer, so they can be embedded in source code comments, or in markdown document without requiring e.g. Gitlab to properly render the document. And even then, they're still "rendered" when editing said markdown document.
benrutter 9mo ago
I think context matters, often I might be writing docs in a text format that doesn't support mermaid (some readmes for instance, or a print put in a CLI tool) and want diagrams. In those contexts, rendered mermaid as html isn't an option, so this really does seem like one of the best calls for human readability.
dmos62 9mo ago
A lot of people primarily use markdown and command-line, and, importantly, so do many coding agents (which seems to be the authors' primary use case).
- esafak 9mo ago
  GFM supports Mermaid.
jbstack 9mo ago
What you mean is that you don't find ASCII diagrams useful. Other people do (see other comments). I find them useful for Org Mode where I prefer to work with just text instead of having to keep separate image files together with my .org files. They're also easier to work with if you need to check them into a Git repo and you don't want to be bothered with something like Git LFS or git-annex. The fact that there are people who want them is enough to explain "why there's a push toward" them (assuming there is actually such a push).

gregoriol 9mo ago

You can put ASCII diagrams in code comments. Also Claude code in the terminal can show them.

deleted 9mo ago
[deleted]

tuetuopay 9mo ago

They don't need a renderer, so they can be embedded in source code comments, or in markdown document without requiring e.g. Gitlab to properly render the document. And even then, they're still "rendered" when editing said markdown document.

benrutter 9mo ago

I think context matters, often I might be writing docs in a text format that doesn't support mermaid (some readmes for instance, or a print put in a CLI tool) and want diagrams. In those contexts, rendered mermaid as html isn't an option, so this really does seem like one of the best calls for human readability.

dmos62 9mo ago

A lot of people primarily use markdown and command-line, and, importantly, so do many coding agents (which seems to be the authors' primary use case).

esafak 9mo ago
GFM supports Mermaid.

jbstack 9mo ago

What you mean is that you don't find ASCII diagrams useful. Other people do (see other comments). I find them useful for Org Mode where I prefer to work with just text instead of having to keep separate image files together with my .org files. They're also easier to work with if you need to check them into a Git repo and you don't want to be bothered with something like Git LFS or git-annex. The fact that there are people who want them is enough to explain "why there's a push toward" them (assuming there is actually such a push).