[Pmwiki-users] Idea for extension of special list syntax

Neil Herber nospam
Fri Jan 21 14:44:17 CST 2005


At 2005-01-21  01:58 PM -0700, Patrick R. Michaud is rumored to have said:
> > An other "feasible" new feature I'd like to have is to let ordered list
> > markup handle an optional numeric argument giving the current item's list
> > value, so the following markup:

I feel an attack of creeping featuritis coming on. Where did I put the 
ointment?

Would it be possible to solve all of these weird and wonderful list nesting 
and numbering problems by adding markup which performs almost exactly like 
an unordered list but allows arbitrary items as the hanging indent?

For example, if + was my indicator for this type of list:

+1.+ this is item one
++1.1+ this is item 1.1
+++1.1(a)+ this is item 1.1(a)

++++ this is just a paragraph under  1.1(a)

+7.+ this is item two numbered seven

   .....  would give this:

1. this is item one
      1.1  this is item 1.1
          1.1(a)  this is item 1.1(a)

                      this is just a paragraph under  1.1(a)

7. this is item two numbered seven


The numbering scheme could be arbitrarily obscure and complicated. If the 
indicator count shows the indent level.

Although this may not be intuitive, neither are lists with non-sequential 
numbering. I suspect that something more complicated than bulleted or 
numbered lists are very rarely used, but when a user of such lists arrive 
on the scene, he wants to use lots of them.

The only downside I see to this scheme is that it does not update 
automatically, but that is more than balanced off by not introducing 
complex parsing for infrequently used markups to PmWiki.



Neil

Neil Herber
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Eton Systems, 15 Pinepoint Drive, Nepean, ON, Canada K2H 6B1
Tel: (613) 829-4668 




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