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I think that the human readable rendering of a csv file in a gemini client is a good feature as such. On the other hand, let's not forget why we use tables, we don't make databases. This approach forces you to multiply as many files as you want to integrate tables, which seems to me to be a very cumbersome way of working.
gemini://auragem.space/~krixano/20210531.gmi
The second proposal solves the problem of multiple files by integrating them directly into the body of the document. It solves this aspect, but on the other hand, it makes the source file unreadable. Yes, I say non-readable: have you ever had fun counting the number of commas in a csv file to know which column it corresponds to? This would mean that it would not be possible to read the information correctly without using a client, which seems to me to go against the philosophy of gemtext.
in a purely non-objective way, I also find that integrating csv or other variant in a gemtext is not elegant.
It is also to put the foot in the door to integrate little by little code in the gmi files what seems to me not to go in the philosophy of gemtext.
The first time I saw the tables with the preformatted text blocks, I, like I think a lot of people, thought it was a bit of a hodgepodge. But now, having seen in which context it was needed (gemlog) and the other possible solutions, I find it a very interesting way to present tabular data. I would like to point out that for me, a table is not a presentation but a content. A 2-dimensional information can hardly be transmitted without using a table, it is not just cosmetic.
if we compare the size of the files, the csv and derived version wins by far. This is of course quite true, but I remind you that the goal is not to write databases, so most of the time the size will not matter given the volume of data.
In this sense the use of preformatted text already plays its role well. The only problem I see is that it's not very clean and the tables are relegated to second-class status with everything that doesn't fit, which I think is a shame.
That's why, in order to facilitate its integration, a specific tag ||| that would be used like the preformatted text ``` tag seems to me an elegant solution.
For me it is more a problem of text editor and for example with vim, we can already easily do a lot of work. It is indeed a point to dig (to be inspired by orgmode ?) and to improve.
we should think about a precise and simple standard to represent a table. First of all, the use of ascii characters ( = - | ) seems to me important, the nice rendering with unicode characters can be done on the client side.
This would greatly facilitate parsing and homogenize the rendering of source files. We could also have a "compatibility" mode that would try to parse more exotic forms of table if the need would be felt. In any case, I don't have a strong opinion on the matter.
# Star Wars Comics => /starwars/search Search Star wars chronology Title,Issues,Years,Publisher Star Wars,75,2015-2019,Marvel Darth Vader,25,2015-2016,Marvel Kanan,12,2015-2016,Marvel Doctor Aphra**,40,2016-2019,Marvel Poe Dameron,31,2016-2018,Marvel Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith,25,2017-2018,Marvel Star Wars Adventures,32,2017-2020 IDW
how to specify that the cells are merged ? it could just be the same data in two different cells and it's difficult to read informations for me for the first table for example.
# Star Wars Comics => /starwars/search Search |||Star wars chronology ----------------------------------------------------------------------- | Title | Issues | Years | Publisher | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- | Star Wars | 75 | 2015-2019 | Marvel | | Darth Vader | 25 | 2015-2016 | Marvel | | Kanan | 12 | 2015-2016 | Marvel | | Doctor Aphra** | 40 | 2016-2019 | Marvel | | Poe Dameron | 31 | 2016-2018 | Marvel | | Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith | 25 | 2017-2018 | Marvel | | Star Wars Adventures | 32 | 2017-2020 | IDW |
First table is for classic format (single line data) with label and foot note which is detected because there is no last line in the table.
Last table illustrate multiline, cell merging and higlighting another line than the header.