Type-able Text Markup for Structured Writing
TypeText
====
Christian Augustin
2012-10-20 22:09
2012-10-21 19:39
Draft


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Document Topics

-> "-- Why"
-> "-- General Content Model"



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What is this all about?

:TypeText: is my approach to create a "plain text formatting syntax" (as John Gruber characterizes his Markdown), mainly for use with simple writing environments, a.k.a. "text editors". It qualifies as a ->"lightweight markup language" [http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/ Lightweight_markup_language].

Why not using one of those many existing thingies out there (like Markdown, Textile, Setext, atx, Grutatxt, EtText, reStructuredText, POD, AsciiText, various Wiki syntax variants, WikiCreole etc.)?

Because I'm not satisfied by their look (yeah, well, that's about aesthetics ...) and their readability - or rather "scanability" - when things get a little bit more complicated. And they do not have enough content elements for my liking. But I borrowed many of the ideas used by them.

And then there's this idea of having a "typewriter-style" formatting for ->"Structured Writing" in simple text editors. I used something in this direction in my plain text emails, and it occured to me that it would be suitable for a wider range of applications ...

And here's the catch: It is not about formatting, it's about content, abstractions, structure - and about writing!

For more reasoning about the need for Just Another Lightweight Markup see ->"TypeText -- Why".



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Where does the name "TypeText" come from?

The idea was to have a "markup" that would be suitable for touch typing  (or more precisely for easy ten-finger typing - see the next point).

At its first incarnation, TypeText was meant to be easily useable on a touch device, particularly on the iPad with its greatly reduced keyboard layout. Therefor it was first named "TouchMark" ...



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What does it mark up?

TypeText is for _content only_, not for page layout!



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What can I use it for?

By now (February 2012) you can use it simply as your "plain-text formatting style", especially if you are using plain-text emails and text files for your daily work. Your readers will understand it right away without any introduction, and you can clearly communicate your ideas without worry and with the simplest tools - even with a mechanical typewriter (if you can find one ;)).

Sometimes in the future there should be a parser (or more than one) so that TypeText could be used for web publishing, and in the end it should be usable for document creation of all sorts ...



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Having fun ...

Now, here's the perfect accessory for using TypeText:

-> "USBTypewriter" [http://www.usbtypewriter.com/ ]
-> "USBTypewriter Demo Video on YouTube" [http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=6woj828GZTo]

;)

(Found 2012-03-09 via -> "Welt Online: Das sind die skurrilsten Neuheiten von der Cebit" [http://www.welt.de/ wirtschaft/ webwelt/ article13913308/ Das-sind-die-skurrilsten-Neuheiten-von-der-Cebit.html])



 
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