Subject: [Xml-sg-cmt] commentary from rfc-markdown

From: Robert Sparks <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Jul 2021 19:53:11 -0500

In case you aren't all following the rfc-markdown list in realtime, 
please be aware of the thread containing this message: 
https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/rfc-markdown/91sjZaSp983ieBSY4rBTJkTQoDw/

RjS

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From: "John R Levine" <[email-masked]>
Date: 26 Jul 2021 22:14:15 -0400

> In case you aren't all following the rfc-markdown list in realtime, please be 
> aware of the thread containing this message: 

Sigh.

Regards,
John Levine, [email-masked], Taughannock Networks, Trumansburg NY
Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly

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From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 27 Jul 2021 09:52:20 -0600

>> https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/rfc-markdown/91sjZaSp983ieBSY4rBTJkTQoDw/

I wasn't on this list until now.

> Sigh.

Well, in one sense v3 is definitely ready for production use because
it's been used in production since RFC 8650. ;-)

Peter

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From: "John R Levine" <[email-masked]>
Date: 27 Jul 2021 12:04:07 -0400

> it's been used in production since RFC 8650. ;-)

We appear to have a severe misapprehension about the point of using XML 
here.  If the goal were just to make it easy to produce nice looking 
documents without imposing a parsable structure , we'd use MS Word like a 
lot of other SDOs.

Regards,

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From: Robert Sparks <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 27 Jul 2021 11:24:48 -0500

But the point of keeping the authoring process friendly is not something 
we can ignore.

You're looking at this only through the lens of publishing RFCs I think 
- at least that's what would motivate your comment.

We also need to facilitate the capture of ideas and ease of 
collaboration. Maybe that's all "working markdown" and we work with 
Carsten and Miek to make it such that they're comfortable producing v3 
from their tools rather than the hybrid v3-in-v2 approach Carsten, at 
least, is currently taking. A lot of the pressure driving him to the 
hybrid form is working around things we know we're eventually going to 
fix (like regularizing what can be in block elements). If we get that 
_done_, I think he'd be a lot closer to ready to think in terms of 
producing v3. That particular large step is in Peter's hands per my 
recollection?

RjS

On 7/27/21 11:04 AM, John R Levine wrote:
> We appear to have a severe misapprehension about the point of using 
> XML here.  If the goal were just to make it easy to produce nice 
> looking documents without imposing a parsable structure , we'd use MS 
> Word like a lot of other SDOs.
>
> Regards,

---

From: "John R Levine" <[email-masked]>
Date: 27 Jul 2021 13:06:02 -0400

> But the point of keeping the authoring process friendly is not something we 
> can ignore.

Of course, but the solution is to make the tools better, not to make the 
XML worse.

> We also need to facilitate the capture of ideas and ease of collaboration. 
> Maybe that's all "working markdown" and we work with Carsten and Miek to make 
> it such that they're comfortable producing v3 from their tools rather than 
> the hybrid v3-in-v2 approach Carsten, at least, is currently taking.

I appreciate all the work that Carsten has done but I also think we are 
seeing why it is not a great idea to depend on part time volunteers to 
develop and maintain our tools.

Regards,