From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
From: Stefan Nobis <stefan-ml@snobis.de>
Subject: Re: Citation syntax: a revised proposal
Date: Mon, 16 Feb 2015 09:53:50 +0100
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In-Reply-To: <877fvjm7f3.fsf@berkeley.edu> (Richard Lawrence's message of
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Richard Lawrence <richard.lawrence@berkeley.edu> writes:

> Rasmus <rasmus@gmx.us> writes:

>> Parts I hate:

>>     The flag is either `@' or `&'.  `@' [...] The optional hyphen (`-') 

>> Too many weird symbols that I won't be able to remember, much less explain
>> to somebody else.

> I don't love these either, but I am not sure what a better
> alternative would be.

I would say, just keep "@" to mark the key. The others are not really
needed. Both, "&" and "-" are better handled by a nice internal
syntax, something like

  [cite:command ...]

or

  [cite: ... @key :part year ...]

These internal extensions via keywords are IMHO much nicer that the
"%%(...)" variant (as a programmer I also like "%%(...)", but not as
an author).

I think this kind of syntax (only plain "@key" or maybe "[@key]" as
shortcut and everything else within "[cite:...]") is also easier to
handle with overlays, user input helpers etc.

Some input helper can make remembering all the options and keywords
inside [cite:...] a non-issue and overlays will render it nice in the
text. Therefore the syntax should be rather simple and regular with as
few exceptions and shorthands as sensible.

-- 
Until the next mail...,
Stefan.