Dear Nicolas,

On 27.03.2013, at 17:26, Nicolas Goaziou wrote:

>> ...
>> 
>> but now the white space around the arguments is no longer stripped and/or other effects cause "<" and ">" in the macro to be exported as "&lt;" etc.
>> 
>> This version seems to work fine:
>> 
>> {{{mhead-hcard(Dr. Stefan
>> Vollmar,Stefan,,Vollmar,Dr.,stefan-vollmar.jpg,stefan-vollmar.html,Head
>> of IT Group\,<br/>Physicist\, Software
>> Developer,vollmar@nf.mpg.de,it,+49 221 4726-213,+49 221 4726-298)}}}
> 
> I removed trimming around arguments a few days ago, since it wasn't an
> explicit specification for macros. Therefore, newline characters are
> inserted in your template, which means that the HTML keyword doesn't
> affect all lines of the generated code and, as a consequence, some "<"
> are exported as "&lt;".

OK, thanks - that obviously explains it. I think you are absolutely right that our previous solution was build around unspecified assumptions.

> I think all newline characters should be replaced with a whitespace
> character in macro arguments. Indeed, macro templates are only one line
> long but unwanted "\n" could be inserted by paragraph filling in
> arguments.

You are referring to some workaround that could mimick the old behaviour? Could you give an example? (Maybe this might be of interest for some simple "legacy cases" of ours)

> I also don't mind trimming arguments again, provided this is added as an explicit behaviour and there is no opposition to it.

From my point of view it would be convenient for some code we already have and do not need to change - but, on second thoughts, you are right: it is somewhat artificial.

>> Yes, I could use it as a workaround, but I would prefer something
>> similar to the above version for improved readability - maybe by
>> adding "line continuation markers" like "\"? Obviously, more complex
>> macros (the one above has 12 individual arguments) are less than ideal
>> anyway and the best solution (by far) would be "named arguments".
>> Maybe there already is a better way of using (HTML) templates?
> 
> I think you really shouldn't use macros for that. For example, consider
> adding the following in your buffer (or, better, in the Library of
> Babel):
> 
>  #+name: mhead-hcard
>  #+header: :var cname="Complete Name" gname="Given Name" photo="photo.jpg" prefix=""
>  #+header: :var web="web-page.html"
>  #+BEGIN_SRC org :exports none
>  <div id="contact" class="vcard">
>    <p>
>      <table style="margin-left:0;margin-right:auto">
>        <tr style="text-align: left;margin-left: 2em">
>          <td style="padding: 5px">
>            <img width="200px" class="photo" src="images/$photo" alt="$cname" />
>          </td>
>          <td><a style="color:blue;" class="url" href="http://www.nf.mpg.de/cv/$web">
>            <div class="fn n">
>              <span class="honorific-prefix">$prefix</span>
>              <span class="given-name">$gname</span>
>  ...
>  #+END_SRC
> 
> Then, you insert a hcard with:
> 
>  #+call: mhead-hcard(cname="Dr. Stefan Vollmar",gname="Stefan",prefix="Dr.",web="stefan-vollmar.html",photo="stefan-vollmar.jpg") :results html

EXCELLENT - this is much better than what I had hoped for. Here is another happy Babel fan!

Warm regards,
 Stefan
-- 
Dr. Stefan Vollmar, Dipl.-Phys.
Head of IT group
Max-Planck-Institut für neurologische Forschung
Gleueler Str. 50, 50931 Köln, Germany
Tel.: +49-221-4726-213  FAX +49-221-4726-298
Tel.: +49-221-478-5713  Mobile: 0160-93874279
E-Mail: vollmar@nf.mpg.de   http://www.nf.mpg.de