Question

I found the the pages TWiki.TWikiShorthand and TWiki.TextFormattingRules are duplicates that are out of synch! I can't see any reason for the duplication. Shouldn't these be combined & collapsed?

While I'm at it, I think a link to TWiki.FormattedSearch is also appropriate for that page to help people find it when they need it.

• TWiki version: whatever's used on twiki.org
• Web server: Apache
• Server OS: Linux
• Web browser: Mozilla
• Client OS: Linux

-- GrantBow - 30 Nov 2002

Answer

This needs to be cleaned up, is unfinished work. MikeMannix intends to retire TWiki.TextFormattingRules in favor of TWiki.TWikiShorthand. These is however an open question how to handle all the existing Plugins that point to TWiki.TextFormattingRules.

Please feel free to add useful links. Lots of cross-linking results in better navigation.

-- PeterThoeny - 06 Dec 2002

I've added a little bit about TWiki.FormattedSearch. So do I understand correctly that this combination hasn't taken place because of the existing use of the page on the current TWiki.org? OK, I understand this dilemma. I'm sure others have it too. Has a feature ever been suggested to allow references to a topic to be changed to another topic during the first topic deletion?

I hope that makes sense, let me rephrase. When deleting a TopicA that is referenced elsewhere, it would be nice to be asked what to change all those existing links to point to, for example TopicB. This is the same functionality as a topic rename but in a different circumstance.

-- GrantBow - 04 Jan 2003

Would possibly having TWiki.TextFormattingRules just include TWiki.TWikiShorthand be a solution? TWikiShorthand could have a small notice at the top indicating the page is being deprecated, encouraging site administrators update all the links in their TWiki's to the new page. This would be similar to a deprecation warning in software languages, mildly annoying, doesn't break anything, and hopefully over time, someone will fix it.

At the same time, it might be good to create a new page (or section in Plugins.TWikiPlugins for plugin authors with things they need to update in their plugins for newer versions of TWiki, with notes about any implications the changes might have. (For example: does TextFormattingRules have some useful information in older versions of TWiki that TextFormattingRules doesn't that the plugin might consider summarizing somewhere in their plugin.) This is similar to the way Debian tries to keep it's 30,000+ packages fairly uniform even when core specs are changed. All plugins should conform to the Dec 2001 spec, but will become less popular if they don't get updated to the Jan 2003 spec.

-- MikeMaurer - 5 Jan '03

Peter and I talked about this on the phone. I think what will happen is that since TWiki.TWikiShorthand was never in an official release, the changes will be moved to TWiki.TextFormattingRules even though the name might be intimidating to new users. Peter said he would handle this when last we talked on on the BeijingRelease page. Peter, if I recalled this incorrectly, please let me know.

-- GrantBow - 09 Jan 2003