Menu ⇓
  1. ↪ Ben Werdmuller: I don't get why you'd use markdown to blog on your own site. Markdown is useful: an easy-to-use notation system that allows you to mark up your text in a safe, fast way. Because you're never letting your users write raw code, there aren't any worries about them posting malware or exploit attempts, or accidentally writing bad markup. At the same time, simple lines and dashes are converted to valid HTML. Everybody wins. But when you're writing your own site, you don't need to worry about those things. You don't care about you posting malware or exploit attempts. (Either you want to, or you won't.) You also don't need to worry as much about bad markup - and if you're not proficient in HTML, you can install a WYSIWYG editor, like the one in WordPress. Unless you're a Dr Jeckyll who morphs into an id-like alter ego without warning, you don't need to worry about your own trustworthiness as a user of your own system. On a self-hosted #indieweb site, all #markdown does is restrict what you can do. It has a syntax to learn, just like basic HTML does, and because you actually have to keep in mind which HTML tags it uses when you write it, it's actually a little bit more complicated to remember. I like a lot of the goals of new publishing platforms like Ghost (I backed it on Kickstarter) but this feature sticks out like a sore thumb to me. I'm not at all sure this is the best writing experience on the web. And I don't see what's wrong with HTML. Updated to add: I've had lots of feedback by people who point out that they just want to write text, not HTML, which is more than fair enough. But surely this shows demand for a smarter, context-sensitive rich text editor rather than another syntax to learn. Why couldn't an editor know to start creating bullet points when you type an asterisk and a space at the beginning of a new line? 13m

    @benwerd I use markdown for initial authoring purely for speed, esp. when typing on mobile devices. After that I just edit the HTML. I’ve yet to come across a WYSIWIM editor which satisfied my semantic, well-structured HTML needs, any suggestions?

  4. ↪ Ben Werdmuller: @barnabywalters Btw, I don't actually see datetime format guidelines in the mf2 spec. Hoping moving to the time attribute helps. 8m

    @benwerd explained here and here — essentially <time class="dt-*" datetime="yyyy-mm-ddThh:mm:ss±hhmm">human representation</time> is the preferred format.

    Sorry about the messy state of the mf2 docs at the moment, we’re working on it!

  9. @scottjenson RE google maps, I hear you. This particular problem could be solved by an app which remembers your speed, then displays the concentric rings. It assumes internet access/cached maps, GPS data and a device capable of displaying it — what if the device transmitting the information was a pedometer/similar which knows my speed but not location, has no internet access or way of displaying maps?

    I’m a fan of more ambient approaches like this because they enhance my own senses (in this case my poor sense of timing) without trying to run my life, as apps seem to want to do. I see it as a fundamentally different approach; apps make me perform a task and give me output. Ambient information enhances my senses and gives me more context within which to make decisions.

  10. ↪ Scott Jenson: Talking about “I'm looking links to non-goofy IoT scenarios” on @branch. Who has something to add? http://t.co/bSSQ5guXQD

    @scottjenson here’s a little one I came up with recently: intelligent map billboards.

    I’m walking through a city I’m not familiar with, going to a concert at 19:35. I headed out a little late but am confident I’ll get there in time.

    I approach a map billboard. My phone and the billboard connect; either because I’ve given it permissions to connect to devices owned by the city council or just by default.

    The billboard requests my average speed over the last 5 mins, and, as this is a piece of data I’m happy to share, my phone complies. The billboard updates it’s display with concentric rings centred around the “you are here”, showing where I can go in 5, 10, 15 minutes if I continue at my present speed. Possibly it would also show the time I would get there.

    I see that the concert venue is just outside the 10 minutes ring; the ETA being 19:45. Damn, that’s 10 minutes late! I speed up my pace or get on a city bike and arrive at the concert in time.

  18. ↪ Sandeep Shetty: PubSubHubbub (by Google for Google) or any push based solution for the web is unnecessarily complex for #indieweb. Polling works just fine.

    sandeepshetty hm, I'd actually say push based systems are super useful (certainly I have personal use cases which are too big for me to want to poll) but PuSH is way too complicated. It’s actually something I’m working on improving, as you did with Pingback => webfinger

  20. ↪ Emil Björklund: What is the equivalent of a unit test for HTML + CSS? (Yes, I know of Selenium, webdriver etc, but I'm fishing for other answers as well.)

    @thatemil I’ve always considered style guides/pattern libraries to be unit tests for HTML+CSS, and you could automate them with JS if they get too unwieldy.