Re: Ordered List (Alphabetical) and HTML Export

[Bastien <bzg@gnu.org>]

Nicolas Goaziou <n.goaziou@gmail.com> writes:

>>> Let's think about it. If user has a non-nil
>>> `org-list-allow-alphabetical' and don't use them, should we make sure
>>> that items are _never_ alphabetical in the output (i.e. always numbers)?
>>
>> Clearly no.
>
> Interesting. As you know, pdflatex will produce, at some levels, alpha
> bullets for ordered lists, unless told otherwise. So,
>
>   a. Item     exported to     1. Item
>
> is wrong (hence your patch), but
>
>   1. Item     exported to     (a) Item
>
> isn't wrong (according to your answer). I just cannot make sense out of
> it. Either Org controls totally its output (my head hurts just thinking
> about it) or it doesn't. Your patch stands in-between: it's confusing.

Maybe I misunderstand your question.

If a user has (setq org-list-allow-alphabetical t) but don't use
alphabetical lists, I don't see where is the problem.

> The only promise wrt bullet type and export is: export will preserve
> `ordered', `unordered' and `description' status of plain lists. That's
> all. Supporting this "simple" thing already requires hundreds lines of
> code in some export back-ends.

I know.  But speaking of structure vs. appearance: ODT has no notion
of descriptive lists, this is just a visual emulation of it.  So the
choice of limiting the syntax to `ordered', `unordered', `description'
is fine to me, but has some arbitrary ground too.

> Currently, in Org syntax, "a) b) c)" is an alias for "ordered list", as
> "1) 2) 3)".
>
>> I would perfectly understand that it's too much maintainance ahead.
>> This sounds perfectly reasonable to me -- and (perhaps paradoxically)
>> less arbitrary than "this does not fit Org's function, this is only
>> aesthetic."
>
> OK. Count me in the "too much maintenance ahead", then.

Fair enough.

>> Alphabetical lists are aesthetic sugar both in Org and its outputs,
>
> I do not agree with "and its outputs" part, since there was nothing in
> this direction before your patch.

I was speaking of alphabetical lists in general: they are aesthetic
sugar in HTML as well (i.e. there is no <aol> tag for "alphabetical
ordered list".)

>> and Org is nice because it tries to keep the input and output both
>> structurally and aesthetically similar.
>
> Does it? In Beamer back-end, a block is very different, visually
> speaking, from a headline.

It does where it can.

-- 
 Bastien