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@skyjake I have another idea for lagrange 😁 It'd be cool to have a simple table interface for csv files. Astrobotany uses them for the leaderboards, and I'm considering using them for a database project...
Although, there isn't hyperlinking in them. I wonder if a new document format that combines hyperlinking and CSV would be interesting....
2 years ago · 👍 aka_dude, know
@skyjake I guess if tab was the separator that was used, that might be better, idk. · 2 years ago
Ah you're right, spaces would have to be considered as special padding characters and not part of the table cells. CSV is perhaps not the best format for embedding via preformatted blocks then, since it doesn't have a very graceful fallback for incompatible viewers. · 2 years ago
@skyjake I've just confirmed that the current spec *does* allow for interpreting the alt text in the way you described, so that's good. I like your idea a lot. I also like the idea of inline CSV tables. I don't know what you meant by padding CSV tables with spaces though. Wouldn't those spaces be put in the CSV table (for things that do parse CSV)? In CSV, spaces aren't supposed to be stripped, afaik. · 2 years ago
@skyjake That makes sense, I just wasn't sure if it was necessarily allowed by gemini's spec (and the spec isn't going to undergo any big changes anytime soon, if ever). I seem to remember some people were against the idea of using the alt text as a language identifier for code, etc. By technically it is possible to put a mimetype in the alt text, as long as you can distinguish between that and any other non-mimetype alt text (which is definitely doable). · 2 years ago
@krixano Rather than extending CSV with gemtext, I think a more general-purpose solution would be to have text/csv as a preformatted block inside a regular gemtext file. Then you can have all of gemtext and any number of tables embedded. Using the alt text as MIME type could also be used to specify the CSV separator character if it isn't a comma.
Such embedded CSV tables could be padded with spaces (by the author) to make them readable in clients that don't render the table.
@mozz Inline CSV via a text/csv link would definitely be cool, and it would be consistent with how inline images work in general. · 2 years ago
The ability to view csv tables inline when you click the link, like images, would be cool. · 2 years ago
@krixano btw, there was a conversation on maillist about tables: https://lists.orbitalfox.eu/archives/gemini/2021/004645.html (there was a gemini mirror somewhere but I lost the link) · 2 years ago
I have just written a new post that talks about what a new document format for this could look like: gemini://pon.ix.tc/~krixano/20210531.gmi · 2 years ago
@aka_dude CSV would just be values separated by commas. A new document format that adds hyperlinking would retain the comma separated values syntax, but maybe allow at the beginning or end of the document the gemtext link syntax (`=> url title`). These are just some initial thoughts. I'm not sure on it yet though... Perhaps the extension could be .gmicsv or .gcsv or something. · 2 years ago
How is it supposed to look like? Columned text/gemini? · 2 years ago