Re: Thoughts on the standardization of Org

[Russell Adams]

On Tue, Nov 03, 2020 at 04:14:41AM -0800, Ken Mankoff wrote:
> It seems like you have never used Orgzly or read on Org file on
> GitHub. Those are not ideas, but are actual current real-world
> win-win implementations of parts of Org outside of Emacs.

Supporting a subset of trivial formatting options from Org should be
that, trivial. Those items are not changing and fairly standardized
already. Could an existing Markdown importer be trivially altered to
support basic Org formats? I suspect that's what Github did.

If that's the case, why are we even arguing? What is missing that so
desperately needs standardization?

> Again: GitHub. Orgzly. The conversation should move from "it can't
> be done" or "it isn't helpful" (why so much negativity on this
> thread?) to

Not negative for negative sake or dismissing new ideas. However
understand there is a lack of resources working on Org as it stands
today. Org has grown exponentially in use cases for years, and there's
no way to expect our devs to keep up with that, much less tooling for
users outside of Emacs. I'm barely involved in the periphery, but I've
watched since 2006. It's a thankless job maintaining any popular OSS
project. I'm grateful for what has been done already, I have no
standing to ask for more or demand time spent on outside software.

We are already having to argue over what is core, and what is an addon
because every advanced user has extensions they want to make. Org
ballooned dramatically and is having to be trimmed.

> + What parts can be standardized and re-implemented outside of
> Emacs.

I'm negative on this because it's outside of Emacs. I like having
clear documentation and a good reference for the benefit of Emacs
users.

Why ask for developer time for external environments? Why contribute
to centralized non-free services who exploit our integration for more
marketshare?

> + How do we support 3rd-party implementation in a way that benefits
> all of us.

I'd rather invest our time on improving our internal implementation,
documentation, and support.

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Russell Adams                            RLAdams@AdamsInfoServ.com

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