[Wikitech-l] Re: [Announce] <graph> plugin

Thu Jan 13 19:23:53 UTC 2005

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Moin,

On Thursday 13 January 2005 19:43, Jakob Voss wrote:
> Tels wrote:
> > having written a <graph>-plugin for Mediawiki, I would like to
> > announce it here.
> >
> > It takes textual graph descriptions between <graph></graph> like
> > this:
>
> ...
>
> > However, before I wander off over the proverbial big cliff, I'd
> > rather get some corrections. Read: please tell me what you think
> > about it, whether this is going to be usefull/work/bring world-peace
> > etc.
>
> Thanks a lot for your efford but *please* do not try to invent another
> language. GraphViz's dot-language is a powerful standard for graphs
> almost like TeX is a standard for formulars.

> > My main interest in this area lies in _easily_ documentating network
> > plans, flow charts, schematics and other things in that area. IMHO
> > having such a feature in a wiki would be very usefull.
>
> Then please call it <easygraph> or something like this. I'd better like
> a plugin for all kind of graphs and GraphViz is obviously the best one.

I have to disagree.

First, I didn't know that there is a graphviz plugin (or anyother 
extension, I overlooked extension), and if there is a name-clash, I will 
rename my plugin.

Second:

Even knowing the graphviz plugin, I would redo the work I did for several 
reasons:

* output: I don't like these types of graph-images. Beside that I like 
ASCII/HTML output over PNG etc, IMHO the output of graphviz looks ugly.
* I find the graphviz language too complicated in the same sense that HTML 
is too complicated over the normal wiki language. Compare  the example 
from http://www.wickle.com/wikis/index.php/Graphviz_extension with one of 
my more complicated examples, I think my formatting is visual more 
distinct. (Of course, both languages should be "equivalent", e.g. it 
should be possible to write a converter - which means the language the 
graph is written in will be irrelevant)

Anyway, thanx for your input,

Tels

- -- 
 Signed on Thu Jan 13 20:11:45 2005 with key 0x93B84C15.
 Visit my photo gallery at http://bloodgate.com/photos/
 PGP key on http://bloodgate.com/tels.asc or per email.

 "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged
 demo."  -- Andy Finkel, computer guy

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.4 (GNU/Linux)

iQEVAwUBQebK03cLPEOTuEwVAQHQRgf9HXWX2EwLfplFquyHwKC4xiIxjGpn1jSR
R7/ezivjDLl636099Ah/4ZCqpQJGVrJU1pPIU8FWo3HrO5XiCeyUy4dp0ArLzsZJ
Nokvxj2orBiO38wK8cAUH1BnbP2x9Ig4HLCNS5gOADOE2cbifwUfRvHy4HdYY27M
tGTE+EUbhcS8rDxbigDzb0xtGuzM8kcYWOgwafVpgTuN5n18FoY17aLL2V1DY+QS
nVPH94OYGwwe3IVYwdz8rmb766Ivs4ZVgdguBusMc4Zmn5QDX+b/YzhwgET5WKkX
J82/LKa3os62QQk3xhkOpjzrwQtmT6lwZgWsCji41p0/eaq52tZoFw==
=FPSc
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----