Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG Markdown editor

Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by pseudocomposer on Friday June 23, 2023 @10:09AM (#36447040)

I think there’s a place for WYSIWYG Markdown, and actually, Markdown’s simplicity actually seems like a good opportunity to simplify WYSIWYG and make it mobile-friendly (this tool does not seem to be, so I’ve yet to try it…). In fact, most of us use WYSIWYG Markdown daily in apps like Slack without even thinking about it. That said, I think any general, open solution needs to offer “manual/WYSIWYG” toggles the same way we see “manual/preview” toggles on DockerHub/GitHub, ideally also maintaining cursor position. Markdown’s benefit is definitely its simplicity, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it obviates the utility of WYSIWYG editing.

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by vorpalhex on Friday June 23, 2023 @10:51AM (#36447598)

I support a markdown WYSIWYG flow and it is a constant source of pain for our users. At this point I just tell our users to write markdown plain - and after a 10 minute tutorial, everyone is comfortable doing that.

Slack's "markdown" is horrifically broken and one of the worst markdown experiences in existence. I believe they no longer even refer to it as markdown since they have strayed so far from the spec.

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by StackOverlord on Friday June 23, 2023 @11:31AM (#36448272)

Same problem with the comment box in Reddit.

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by hunter2_ on Friday June 23, 2023 @11:53AM (#36448600)

I always get a good chuckle when I see comments that get unexpectedly processed as a new ordered list. Like if replying to a 3-item comment by starting with "4. " which renders as "1. " -- for the sake of users who don't know these nuances of markdown, I wish it strayed a bit further to accommodate them.

Bold, italics, links, etc. -- sure, false positives there are rare enough and the means of correcting mishaps are intuitive enough. The OL issue though... so many go uncorrected.

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by chatmasta on Friday June 23, 2023 @11:31AM (#36448274)

> the worst markdown experiences in existence

This title belongs to ClickUp.

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by dadoomer on Friday June 23, 2023 @12:07PM (#36448814)

You might like Joplin's approach. It's exactly what you described: you can toggle WYIWYG and plain text.

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by pavo-etc on Friday June 23, 2023 @12:55PM (#36449449)

I love Obsidian's WYSIWYG implementation. It is WYSIWYG until you the cursor is touching any formatted element, at which point it reveals the Markdown that makes it appear that way e.g. h1 titles appear large, but clicking on them reveals the # at the start of the line

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by pxc on Friday June 23, 2023 @01:40PM (#36449975)

* * *

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Re:Show HN: I've built open-source, collaborative, WYSIWYG M... by specialist on Saturday June 24, 2023 @08:37AM (#36458199)

Sounds great. I couldn't (quickly) find any screenshots, so I might just download and try.

FWIW, WordPerfect's "reveal codes" feature remains my ideal solution.

Long before the advent of desktop publishing and GUIs and markup languages. Split screen horizontally, vs vertically side-by-side, with WordPerfect's own nomenclature for formatting attributes. Edit in either screen. Live cursor shown in both screens. Live updates back and forth.

Heaven.

I haven't used WordPerfect for decades, so my bias might just be nostalgia.

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