Short description
One of the most annoying things dealing with Moin (not only for the programmers but also for the users) are the various browser bugs which can spoil the screen output totally. For Moin programmers it takes a lot of time to fix all these bugs for the various browsers, especially for that rotten thing called IE. Time that misses to concentrate on the implementation of new features and fixing bugs - and it's no fun at all. On the other hand users often cannot judge the code quality of Moin, they only see the result on the screen und display problem which lead them to judge the engine as bad. This a bad for MoinMarketing.
The idea is now as follows: Why not outsource the whole caring about browser fixes to a third party by integrating a CSS/HTML framework like e.g. YAML (http://www.yaml.de/index.html and http://drupal.org/node/92325). This would mean:
- More time for programming for the core team since cross browser compatibility is assured by YAML (or another framework) which supports a wide range of browsers accross different platforms
- Easier creation of themes for the users of Moin, easier way to achive really good looking wikis (of course that depends on looking). But easier creation of themes and good-looking result could also mean in the end: a more widespread usage of Moin, more plugin writers etc..
But these are all just ideas I want to share. I'm not experienced enough to judge all the details of the Moin code, YAML code and their integration. But I think to find a way to leave all that layout and browser fixing stuff to a specialist is worth a thought, also the way to ease theme creation for users maybe.
-- OliverSiemoneit 2007-02-06 13:54:57
I had a quick look at http://www.yaml.de/ (btw: bad project name, see http://yaml.org/ - I found this wiki page here by searching for the other YAML) and we can't use this for moin because everything is commented in german and that would be bad for our non-german users and developers. So while your general idea is definitively appealing, we can't use that. -- ThomasWaldmann 2007-04-08 16:23:48
As I could find out here an English version will soon be published. But as far as I can see another prerequisite for an adoption in Moin is not only an English version but also a successfully completed GSOC07 web template project. -- OliverSiemoneit 2007-04-21 21:18:11
An improved YAML in English has been released now, see http://www.yaml.de/de/dokumentation/changelog/version-3x.html -- OliverSiemoneit 2007-07-16 17:38:52
Links
More information on other CSS frameworks (than YAML) - so as to assure cross-browser compatibility easily - could be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSS_framework