Danny Sauer wrote:

> By "presentation" I essentially mean "enhanced formatting".  The content
> should be able to stand on its own, without the help of stylistic
> elements beyond line breaks and paragraphs; without anything but simple
> grouping.  

For one thing, I think graphics can convey certain information much more
efficiently than plain text. And it wasn't me who invented the saying "a
picture's worth... " :)

And it's not for nothing that with time certain "enhancements" to plain
text have found their way into what's considered standard email "plain"
text: *bold* or /italics/ or _underlines_, for example. For the few mail
readers that support this, it kind of clumsily works, and if somebody knows
what they mean she can translate that in the head to some degree even if
the reader doesn't render it appropriately, but IMO that's a weak
substitute for real formatting.

> However, it should merely be an enhancement, not a way to compensate for
> poorly thought-out communication.  Anyone who's ever seen someone give a
> Power Point presentation ...

Of course... poor content doesn't get better with good presentation. But
anyone who's ever read a good book knows that even good stuff doesn't
normally get presented in Courier 11 pt /only/ and can greatly win with
good presentation.


>> A tag system like a simplified HTML (closer to the original version,
>> with only content type markers) would not require any of this.
> 
> You mean modern HTML/XML/SGML with CSS/etc, which separates the content
> from the presentation 

Yes and no. I meant /original/ HTML. Originally, HTML was a structural
markup language rather than a formatting markup language. Elements for
marking paragraphs, headers, citations etc. mostly without any rules on how
to present them -- that was up to the reader. (Then the marketing guys got
a hold of the language and got us where we are now...)

> allowing the end user to apply a transform as appropriate for his viewing
> environment while still getting the same content. :) 

Yes, exactly. Only marking up the text structurally, and let the reader and
her reader program decide how she wants to see it. Such a reduced form of
HTML would be perfect for email -- /much/ better than plain text, IMO. (And
whoever likes the looks of plain text, can display such messages just as if
they were 100% standard-conform plain text messages... :)

Gerhard

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