Last modified: 2012-05-24 08:55:13 UTC
<source> syntax should be removed from SyntaxHighlight (GeSHi) and all occurences replaced by bot, because such tag has so common name, which can be used in various XML applications, namely HTML5 is using it for instance. Having this tag disallows various constructions (see bug 37041 and bug 18820) and forces users to use nasty hacks (if even available) which make the original source less legible.
I don't see this happening anytime soon, we can't just break backwards compatibility like that.
What backwards compatibility if you run a replace bot? Besides isn't full functionality more important than backward compatibility?
(In reply to comment #2) > What backwards compatibility if you run a replace bot? So you want to advice everyone that has syntax setup on their wikis to a. learn how to operate a bot b. run the bot and make the changes I doubt many people/other users care about not being able to use the output in xml based format/exports etc...
(In reply to comment #3) > I doubt many people/other users care about not being able to use the output in > xml based format/exports etc... That's not about XML format/export at all. It's about displaying XML (eg. HTML5) syntactically hilited source on wikis without hacks.
(In reply to comment #2) > What backwards compatibility if you run a replace bot? > > Besides isn't full functionality more important than backward compatibility? I agree with Niklas in comment #1. Even though it would be nice to remove this feature completely, you still cannot just break legacy compatibility. A lot of users depend on this. Yes, you could use a bot/script to clean up the issue and replace it with your own. Just be careful that it does not unintentionally replace the wrong information. To move this thread forward, if you would like to see a script which scrubs the usage of the old "source" tags then please submit one. I see nothing wrong with creating a cleaning system. However if one is to be implemented then it would have to go through a very strict QA process.
Wontfixing this.
Just for the record, aside from valuing wikis that don't have the luxury of bot operators. We also need to consider: * Processes that aren't stored on a wiki page. Think for example a bot that may update a wiki page once a day or month. Fixing that target page doesn't fix the bot that will overwrite that page once a day. * Complex pages with wonderfully constructed meta-templates that may not literally contain <source ?*>, but could contain {{#tag: source}} and the many variations on that. * Protected pages. * ..
Speaking about backward compatibility when it's known that new parser is going to break bunch of current constructions seems to me at least inconsistent...
