Re: Marking/highlighting text temporarily

[Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net>]

Nicolas Goaziou <mail@nicolasgoaziou.fr> writes:

> Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> writes:
>
>> Yup, "annotation mechanism" is about right. Just to be clear, you think
>> it fits into the category of incubation-prior-to-core?
>
> I think so.
>
>> If anyone thinks that this mechanism warrants actual new Org syntax, I'd
>> be happy to work on implementing that.
>
> I also think a new syntax is needed. But, please, let's keep it as
> simple as possible.

We're just talking about annotations-plus-metadata here, right? Not
actual in-text TODOs?

From what I can tell, rasmus seems to be proposing an in-text TODO,
while John's headed in the direction of replicating Track Changes
functionality. I've definitely wanted some sort of a track changes
equivalent in Org, but we'd want to be careful about this.

Assuming we're just talking about annotations on steriods, here are some
things I'd personally like to have:

1. Annotations attached to arbitrary text in the buffer. The buffer text
   should be visible, the annotation data invisible (basically the way
   links work right now).
2. Plain annotation: just a chunk of free-form paragraph text that is
   attached to the buffer text.
3. Replacement text: an alternate version of the buffer text; this could
   be the basis of track changes stuff.
4. Timestamps
5. Custom highlighting
6. Full element status: this would allow parsing of the various
   properties, and more fully-featured export options.
7. "Author" metadata would probably be unnecessary with full access to
   the export channels, but it might still be desirable.
8. Options-line switches to export with annotation, export without
   annotation, and export using replacement text.

That's all I can think of, just trying to get the ball rolling. I don't
have any opinions about actual syntax, though something with curly
braces might be nice.

Eric