roarApr 20, 2017

This is an example of a revolutionary new document
format called "Plain Text". Some of the features of this format are:

* supported by every editor!
* requires no internet connection!
* editable on any device, from your phone to your TV!
* simple to backup and restore!
* compare documents with "diff"!
* search documents with "grep"!
* can be modified programaticaly using "sed" and "awk"!
* Plain-text supports every version control system out there!

Try plain-text today!

Show threadAlgot (Still)Apr 20, 2017

@roar

My only personal extra is the plain text benefit of Markdown.

Still plain text, but easy to accomplish effective fancy RTF through a tool like Pandoc.

Give them a try and see what you think.

Show threadOlivier ForgetApr 20, 2017
@Algot @roar markdown requires that you know all the special meanings of the special characters of the markdown flavor you are using. If you don't you get unexpected formatting. No thanks.
Show threaddrkmttrApr 21, 2017
@teleclimber @Algot @roar It's not THAT hard is it? Even if you just remember headings and lists that's usually sufficient.
Show threadAlgot (Still)

@drkmttr @roar @teleclimber

I'm a fan of markdown.
It seemed the most useful of the formats to use so UNPROCESSED text was still very legible.

Passed through a translator like Pandoc, I can get many useful complex formats without significant extra work.

I think the question was whether plain text was the best choice for raw documentation of a project like Mastodon instead of a strict requirement for a particular toolchain.

Apr 21, 2017 at 2:02pmWeb
Show threadroarApr 21, 2017

@Algot @drkmttr @teleclimber

The question had nothing to do with Mastodon. It was just a rant in relation to having to jump hurdles to use Confluence without using their crappy interface.

I write in markdown (well, multimarkdown mostly) because it's currently the best option, but it's not great (and no, I'm not capable of doing better).