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Markdown (and what do you do when a community outgrows your contribution)

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wraith808:
I love markdown.  I use it when writing everything from fiction, to game books, to documentation at work.  There's something so freeing about being able to write and format in plain text.  However, the specification really sucks.  I can take the same markdown document, and run it through X parsers and get X results.  That's a problem, especially with something that's become so prevalent.  People have played around with making a standard or forking it or several different things... but the biggest holdup has been the creator of it.  He has explicitly said that he didn't really see the need for a specification.  And has consistently not wanted to be at the forefront of development on it.

A few older articles on this issue:

http://blog.codinghorror.com/responsible-open-source-code-parenting/

http://blog.codinghorror.com/the-future-of-markdown/

http://www.fastcolabs.com/3015487/john-gruber-and-jeff-atwood-explain-why-markdown-is-still-growing-up

http://www.garron.me/en/blog/on-the-future-of-markdown.html

So finally, a lot of people got together on the spec... and released a standardized version of markdown.

Then the fireworks started.

I'll let the articles speak for themselves...

http://blog.codinghorror.com/standard-flavored-markdown/

http://blog.codinghorror.com/standard-markdown-is-now-common-markdown/

Before I chime in, I'll ask for thoughts... because I'm sort of split on the issue... and I don't think its over.

Oh... and if you want to see the spec, check http://standardmarkdown.com/.  It will be going away... and not redirected, which I don't understand.  But I'm assuming it will be at http://commonmarkdown.com/

mouser:
Seems like having a common standard is a good idea to me, and it seems pretty obvious to me that having an unambiguous specification is a good thing.
I can understand people vying for different versions of what should be the standard, but i can't see a good argument for not having one.

40hz:
Microsoft built an entire industry based on the proposition that, in the absence of an industry standard, any standard is better than none.

Microsoft provided a missing standard for the personal computer desktop (not a good standard - just a missing one) and went onto unbelievable success and industry dominance.

The wild and woolly frontier is fine as long as it's still a frontier. But once you have towns and cities, and people trying to collaborate and share, standards become desirable for pragmatic reasons if nothing else.

Trying to avoid a standard when it becomes obvious one is both wanted and needed by a large number of users makes zero sense. And I can't follow what Gruber's argument or point seems to be - other than him saying "this is my child - leave it as it is."

In many respects his behavior reminds me of Aesop's "dog in the hayloft." The people who want to extend and standardize markdown seem to be bending over backwards to acknowledge and show respect for Gruber's contribution when they could have just as easily forked and been done with it. But they very much wanted to keep "markdown" in the name and involve Mr.Gruber in the process. However, for some reason, Mr. Gruber seems to be highly offended by their overtures.

Dunno...guess you had to be there or something. I just don't get it. :-\

rgdot:
Standards are ok and needed. It shouldn't be one person's idea though and is probably better for it to be a minimum set that is extensible for certain applications

mwb1100:
The people who want to extend and standardize markdown seem to be bending over backwards to acknowledge and show respect for Gruber's contribution when they could have just as easily forked and been done with it. But they very much wanted to keep "markdown" in the name and involve Mr.Gruber in the process. However, for some reason, Mr. Gruber seems to be highly offended by their overtures.
-40hz (September 05, 2014, 04:05 PM)
--- End quote ---

Personally, I think it would have been nice for this standardization process to be allowed to use the name Markdown.

However, Markdown was created by Gruber and the Markdown project belongs to him. He therefore has the right to decide how the name for that project should be used.  I think this 'fork' should simply use a different name.  I have no doubt it will become successful (since it'll be used on StackExchange, Github, and Reddit).  And it appears that this is the tack that they've taken - the fork is now called CommonMark.

I actually think that in the long run, Gruber's Markdown will largely become a note in the history of CommonMark.  But that doesn't give them the right to the project name.

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