Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/12.144.5.2

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[edit] Discussion of Outside view by Carnildo

Now while I understand and respect Carnildo's impression of the matter, "I consider the en/em dash commands to be vandalism,not "correct"." and "the simplicity advantages of hyphens are overwhelming and the HTML commands an obnoxious conceit." seem, to me at least, to make the issue of browser of choice entirely beside the point.

Regardless of how Lynx does or doesn't "break" them, Louis is changing them deliberately, no doubt for the same reason as his "spaces after punctuation is obselete" view.

Now it could be that he is changing them solely because they don't display correctly for him under Lynx, but I hope that's not the case, as that makes him out to be, quite frankly, a selfish bigot.

But I digress. The main thing is, judging by his response I can't believe that this is Lynx's fault. Garrett^Talk 08:10, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

And Lynx certainly would not break the HTML code for them as it's just plain ASCII, BUT Louis says "the simplicity advantages of hyphens are overwhelming and the HTML commands an obnoxious conceit." in response to him constantly reverting their use.

Now perhaps Lynx can't convert it into an accurate representation of the symbol on his end thus explaining his hatred of the command, and once again it could be Louis is changing it solely because he can't view it, but as above I dearly hope this is not the case. Garrett^Talk 08:14, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree. Louis has stated that it's delibate, not due to Lynx errors. — Phil Welch 08:34, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

Yes,I deliberately remove the HTML commands when it is convenient to do so.They cause me inconvenience as a Lynx-using editor and make no difference to me as a Lynx-using reader,thus their only impact on me is negative.I work with line length limits other browsers may not have,and wasted characters are wasted characters.--Louis E./le@put.com/12.144.5.2 02:17, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

That strikes me as remarkably self-centered. Even if their only impact on you is negative, most of the world does not browse using Lynx. --Prosfilaes 07:48, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

However,the additional characters to page through when editing are a negative effect on everyone even if they don't share my line-length-limit problems.--Louis E./le@put.com/12.144.5.2 03:17, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

Blank lines, such as the one above your comment also increase the "paging through" cost. I suspect that others share my thought that the "paging through" cost is outweighed by the enhanced readability. After all, we are hear to enhance the spread of knowledge, not to make editing simpler. --Habap 15:14, 7 September 2005 (UTC)