On 03/05/11 19:44, MZMcBride wrote: > Chad wrote: >> On Tue, May 3, 2011 at 2:15 PM, MZMcBride<[email protected]> wrote: >>> I realize you have a dry wit, but I imagine this joke was lost on nearly >>> everyone. You're not really suggesting that everyone who wants to parse >>> MediaWiki wikitext compile and run HipHop PHP in order to do so. >> And how is using the parser with HipHop going to be any more >> difficult than using it with Zend? > The point is that the wikitext and its parsing should be completely separate > from MediaWiki/PHP/HipHop/Zend. > > I think some of the bigger picture is getting lost here. Wikimedia produces > XML dumps that contain wikitext. For most people, this is the only way to > obtain and reuse large amounts of content from Wikimedia wikis (especially > as the HTML dumps haven't been re-created since 2008). There needs to be a > way for others to be able to very easily deal with this content. > > Many people have suggested (with good reason) that this means that wikitext > parsing needs to be reproducible in other programming languages. While > HipHop may be the best thing since sliced bread, I've yet to see anyone put > forward a compelling reason that the current state of affairs is acceptable. > Saying "well, it'll soon be much faster for MediaWiki to parse" doesn't > overcome the legitimate issues that re-users have (such as programming in a > language other than PHP, banish the thought). > > For me, the idea that all that's needed is a faster parser in PHP is a > complete non-starter. > > MZMcBride >
I agree completely. I think it cannot be emphasized enough that what's valuable about Wikipedia and other similar wikis is the hard-won _content_, not the software used to write and display it at any given, which is merely a means to that end. Fashions in programming languages and data formats come and go, but the person-centuries of writing effort already embodied in Mediawiki's wikitext format needs to have a much longer lifespan: having a well-defined syntax for its current wikitext format will allow the content itself to continue to be maintained for the long term, beyond the restrictions of its current software or encoding format. -- Neil _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
