Re^3: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others)

I agree that needing to add your own HTML markup is a pain. However my experience with a number of other forums where a WYSIWY(almost never)G is provided has convinced me that PerlMonks' actually has landed in the right place by placing the smarts on the far side of the keyboard.

For reasons I can't fathom every online editor I've used offering more than trivial markup gets it wrong, especially when trying to handle a mixture of prose and code. Some make it almost impossible to post something and have any idea at all what it's going to look like. Even big players like Google can't get simple editing right.

PerlMonks seems to get scorn poured on it for "looking old". Maybe, but I find it much easier to navigate than any other similar forum I've used - bar none! I use Recently Active Threads as my "home page" and open threads I'm interested in reading in a separate tab. In my opinion the sideways tree view makes the flow of conversation much easier to follow than any other forum I use.

Yes, it would be nice if it were easier for noobs to enter nice posts, but for the most part a poorly formatted post is a great heads up that the OP has applied laziness in the wrong way.

I consider for the most part PerlMonks ain't broke, so please don't "fix it"!

Optimising for fewest key strokes only makes sense transmitting to Pluto or beyond

Comment on Re^3: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others)

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Re^4: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others) by Fletch (Bishop) on Feb 03, 2020 at 17:41 UTC
I largely agree (I myself am perfectly used to crafting my own HTML and see no reason noobs can't likewise learn to walk uphill both ways in the snow :), but then I wonder if a markdown option of some sort might not help since everyone and their dog uses it for markup these days. If there were a toggle that defaulted on for new users (and/or you could twiddle per post) that might let the new, unwashed, markdown-accustomed masses contribute "more easily" while still allowing the power users / ancient fogeys to hand lathe their posts. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie. The cake is a lie.	[reply]
Re^5: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others) by marto (Cardinal) on Feb 03, 2020 at 18:15 UTC
I seem to recall someone (possibly ambrus) made something alone these lines years ago, some HTML/JavaScript wizardry that utilised the free nodelet or something. There are links elsewhere in this thread that will likely lead you down the correct rabbit hole.	[reply]
Re^6: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others) by jdporter (Paladin) on Feb 04, 2020 at 19:29 UTC
Possibly found via Free Nodelet Hack search.	[reply]
Re^7: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others) by marto (Cardinal) on Feb 04, 2020 at 20:49 UTC
Re^4: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others) by PerlGuy(Tom) (Acolyte) on Feb 07, 2020 at 06:20 UTC
I detest, for the most part, any WYSIWYG html editor I've ever used. I would not propose that. But paragraph breaks are so frequently used, I think it would be justified. I would not (edit: want to ) have to manually insert space between words with   either. I think if there is a big key on the keyboard for it, (RETURN) why not use it. The whole problem goes back to the 80's only because different computer makers had different implementations for "return". newline for Unix and newline-linefeed for windows. If not for such incompatibuilities, we never would have needed HTML to bridge the divide. Tom	[reply]
Re^5: Making Perl Monks a better place for newbies (and others) by Your Mother (Archbishop) on Feb 07, 2020 at 09:15 UTC
I would not have to manually insert space between words with  either. I take it you mean sentences; joining words with it makes for HTML display disasters. That’s bad style today and going back decades so affording it… If one wanted to attempt a more traditional approach, pedanticism demands &emsp; but then you should probably also be applying &emsp13; or some other traditional typesetting non-\x{20} space for word separation. If not for such incompatibuilities, we never would have needed HTML to bridge the divide. That is an extremely odd thing to say…	[reply]
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