wiki/prosemarkup

Markup for writing


Naming

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightweight_markup_language
A lightweight markup language (LML), also termed a simple or humane markup language, is a markup language with simple, unobtrusive syntax. It is designed to be easy to write using any generic text editor and easy to read in its raw form. Lightweight markup languages are used in applications where it may be necessary to read the raw document as well as the final rendered output.

These are all bad terms. YAML and TOML are are also lightweight. Humane is vague and wishy-washy. As for simple, parsing Markdown can get stupidly complex if you actually address the edge cases. Let's call it what it is: markup for writing. Let's call it Prose Markup.


Abuse

The original Markdown write up reads
https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/syntax#philosophy
https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/syntax.text
Readability, however, is emphasized above all else. A Markdown-formatted document should be publishable as-is, as plain text, without looking like it's been marked up with tags or formatting instructions.

Github: ''hold my beer''

Hyper's README reads
https://github.com/vercel/hyper/blob/canary/README.md
(had to escape the HTML)
        ![](https://assets.zeit.co/image/upload/v1549723846/repositories/hyper/hyper-3-repo-banner.png)

        <p align="center">
          <a aria-label="Vercel logo" href="https://vercel.com">
            <img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/MADE%20BY%20Vercel-000000.svg?style=for-the-badge&logo=ZEIT&labelColor=000000&logoWidth=20">
          </a>
         </p>

        [![Node CI](https://github.com/vercel/hyper/workflows/Node%20CI/badge.svg?event=push)](https://github.com/vercel/hyper/actions?query=workflow%3A%22Node+CI%22+branch%3Acanary+event%3Apush)
        [![macOS CI Status](https://circleci.com/gh/vercel/hyper.svg?style=shield)](https://circleci.com/gh/vercel/hyper)
        [![Windows CI status](https://ci.appveyor.com/api/projects/status/kqvb4oa772an58sc?svg=true)](https://ci.appveyor.com/project/zeit/hyper)
        [![Linux CI status](https://travis-ci.org/vercel/hyper.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/vercel/hyper)
        [![Changelog #213](https://img.shields.io/badge/changelog-%23213-lightgrey.svg)](https://changelog.com/213)
        [![Join the community on Spectrum](https://withspectrum.github.io/badge/badge.svg)](https://spectrum.chat/zeit/hyper)


Links

Inline links suck for plaintext readability.

        [Anchor](https://linked.website)
        [[https://linked.website][Anchor]]
        https://linked.website[Anchor]
        <https://linked.website|Anchor>

This isn't a jab at anyone. You can't expect to drop 50 character URLs in the middle of a paragraph and not have it worsen readability somewhat.

The common alternative are reference links which, in turn, suck for editability. The href moves far from the anchor, and you have a referencing system to manage. Thanks but no thanks.

Another way to solve this problem is to just not. Gemini's Gemtext markup deliberately ommits syntax for mid-paragraph links.

        => https://linked.website Anchor

The stupid-simple markup that powers this wiki goes one step further: it deliberate ommits syntax for anchors too. The href doubles as the anchor. I don't think link anchors belong in body text.


***


Gemtext

Gemtext is way too simple to justify existing. The few formatting niceties it provides are not worth losing the 1to1 WYSIWYGness of serving the same plain text files you edit.