My understanding (which could of course be wrong) is this:
* It is still a goal (at the moment the only complete wiki text specification
is the code that implements the parser).
* Progress towards this goal is stalled.
* The reason it is stalled is because it may not be possible (I think we have a few
90% implementations, where people realised the last 10% could not be done using the
approach used in the other 90%).
* Unless someone has a 100% implementation, or a 90% implementation with a clear
actionable
plan and every reason to believe they can get to 100%, then there's not really any
point
in expending more time on it and discussing it extensively (it's already been
discussed
several times previously on this mailing list, with no resolution).
* Unless someone can prove that it's impossible to implement, then we can't close
the
bug as WONTFIX.
* So, to summarise, it's in limbo, with no clear path out of limbo, either to a
WONTFIX
status, or to a FIXED status. Furthermore, it has a bit of "time black hole"
vibe about
it - that you could potentially throw lots of time and money at it, and have nothing
useful to show for it, kind of like A.I. research ;-) [with apologies to any AI
researchers I just offended, but where's my robot that can learn how to do my
housework
and my shopping?] ... But the flipside is that if anyone can solve this problem, then
they get bragging rights, and several rounds of beer from the rest of us (just as long
as
it's a 100% implementation).
At least, that's my general understanding. If anyone knows better, please correct me.
-- All the best,
Nick.
-----Original Message-----
From: wikitech-l-bounces(a)lists.wikimedia.org
[mailto:wikitech-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org]On Behalf Of Steve
Bennett
Sent: Thursday, 8 November 2007 10:10 AM
To: Wikimedia developers
Subject: [Wikitech-l] EBNF grammar project status?
What's the status of the project to create a grammar for Wikitext in EBNF?
There are two pages:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikitext_Metasyntax
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Markup_spec
Nothing seems to have happened since January this year. Also the comments on
the latter page seem to indicate a lack of clear goal: is this just a fun
project, is it to improve the existing parser, or is it to facilititate a
new parser? It's obviously a lot of work, so it needs to be of clear
benefit.
Brion requested the grammar IIRC (and there's a comment to that effect at
http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=7
), so I'm wondering what became of it.
Is there still a goal of replacing the parser? Or is there some alternative
plan?
Steve
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