Should Jottit move from Wiki syntax to a WYSIWYG editor?
Rationale
We've lately been considering changing from the current wiki syntax solution to a WYSIWYG-based solution. We're worried that the concept of wiki syntax is too hard for non-technical users to understand. This worry stems partly from user testing, partly from talking to other technical people who've tried teaching non-technical people wiki syntax and failed. The hardest concept to grasp seems to be the wiki-style of linking to pages.
Right now our biggest problem seems to be that most users don't even realize that they can use wiki syntax at all. So step one, if we want to keep the current solution, is to make this easier to discover. Also we should work on improving documentation and perhaps making a few screencasts that shows how to use wiki syntax.
Next there's the option of adding buttons to the editor, so instead of having to write *foo*, the user can mark foo, click the bold button and then have the syntax inserted. This might be a really easy way to discover syntax and if you forget the syntax, you always got the button.
What do you think?
Opinion 1: No
The simple, sensible tags in Jottit encourage content publishers to create sites with meaningful markup, rather than focus on visual presentation. Meaningful markup is tremendously valuable, because it makes sites readable by the growing number of browsers beyond personal computers, including screen-readers, phones, iPods, and other hand-held technologies.
Writers of content should use only tags that add valuable meaning to their writing, such as emphasis, headers, quotations, and lists.
I would like to reply to this; I don't think you can expect the average john to even know how to add "valuable meaning" to their text. If these were professional (or at least experienced) writers they would understand the difference between emphasis and italic, for example. Most people, though, just think of /hey/ as a way to get pretty letters.
Heck, most webdevelopers themselves think <em/> is the new <i/>! Asking everybody to understand this, while very noble, is just not feasible. I vote
YESfor a wysiwyg editor; one that uses only <span style=""> tags for markup. No meta-data is better than wrong meta-data. (leave the plain text editor and tell the users about the importance of using that if you must; people that care about their content will be interested enough to get it right while others will not pollute their own websites with erroneous markup).~ posted by Anonymous Coward | Wednesday; December 19, 2007; 23:15 (UTC)
Presentation should be handled strictly through the stylesheet; maybe Jottit could help users customize their styles using another simple markdown language.
The appeal of Jottit is that you don't need to worry about all of that! You just type, add simple tags that contribute meaning, and post it. Users who crave the additional hassle of more complicated presentation should use a different tool.
Jottit focuses on The Simplest Thing That Could Possibly Work. Could the syntax be improved? Sure. Support for abbreviations, transformation of " to inline quotes (outputting xHTML's q tag), would be nice. Should Jottit use a WYSIWYG editor? Only if the developers want to make the internet suck more for the future.
~ posted by john | Wednesday; November 7, 2007;
14:31
I vote for no as well. Jottit works great just the way it is.
~ posted by blaquesaber | Thursday August 7th 2008
Opinion 2: No
It will just increase load time and slow down the editing process. The wiki space is crowded and it was hard enough to find a simple wiki without all the fluff. There's a market for wikis like Jottit. People looking for a wiki with the works have plenty to choose from. Keep your focus on simplicity, ease of use and speed. I love it. There are still a lot of useful features that can be added to Jottit to make it even more enjoyable and easier to use without adding a cumbersome wysiwyg editor.
~ posted by jd | Wednesday; November 7, 2007; 17:58
I vote against anything that will make the site slower.
~ posted by blaquesaber | Thursday August 7th 2008
Opinion 3: No
Or at least, if you do introduce a WYSIWYG editor, make it an option rather than a replacement.
~ posted by gilest | Friday; November 16, 2007; 09:05
Opinion 4: Toolbar
There is already a live preview. Isn't that wysywig enough? But a toolbar could ease the barrier to entry and would provide minimal disruption for purists and power users. Something like the Basecode extension for 37Signals products.
~ posted by gabe | Thursday; November 29, 2007; 09:28
Opinion 5: Toolbar
A toolbar is a great choice - it offers transparency of options to the user, as well as visibility into what's "really" going on. Feels like a compromise, but actually works better than either of the two proposed choices!
~ posted by misuba | If there were a toolbar I would know how we're automatically entering dates here
Opinion 6: never.
I've been using this for a while, and it was easy to understand. I went to use one that was that other one, and my site was deleted in five minutes. I deleted it.
it sucks.
posted by some freak who will never tell you what his name is. thursday; january 8, 2007; 2:33
Opinion 7: Yes
To someone who's not familiar with text-formatting systems, a wiki is the simpler option, even though to a tech-savvy person it seems more complicated. If I had to guess, I would say that most (in fact, likely all) of the responses on this page come from tech-savvy people. Markdown is fine for the tech-savvy, but if you want your website to be used by your average web user... I think WYSIWYG should be the default or only formatting.
Look at it this way: to someone who's familiar with desktop applications more than web applications, it would seem completely bizarre to launch a desktop note-making application and have to type in some code that you're unfamiliar with to format things. Most users are familiar with desktop applications over web applications. I'd venture that most internet users still don't know what a web application is. So if you want Jottit to appeal to them, it should act more like a desktop application.
posted by Harris | Monday; May 19, 2008; 16:37
The Mark Up language is easy to learn with tons-o-resources on line...
~ posted by blaquesaber | Thursday August 7th 2008
Opinion 8: Yes
I am in agreement with the post of Harris.
I think he is right.
posted by Tonivel | Saturday; May 24, 2008; 4:52
Opinion 9: Toolbar
Its nice to be able to just type text, and watch what the editor says it will look like.
But I never remember the markdown syntax, and its kind of a pain to click the formatting help. The toolbar would show me what I want, and I could click it to bold works or whatever. Using the toolbar would actually teach me what markdown syntax is just by watching how it changes my text.
posted by Matt | June 2008
Opinion 10: Yes and No
It is easy as it is.. and I have recently trained a few non-technical people how to use jottit without any major issues.. But, perhaps if you have to go down this track then you could do it something like wmd editor which still shows the wiki markup.. and you don't even have to use the toolbar.. but it's there if you want it.. I probably still vote no though, jottit is lean, mean, and fast as it is. Whatever you do, keep the preview window.
here's an example how I've used wmd, but not lost the markup, or preview views on a site that I maintain.
posted by Paul | August 14th, 2008
Opinion 11: It depends
It depends on what you want Jottit to be. If you only want it to be used by a handful of geeks, don't go WYSIWYG--hey, if you really want to be exclusive, why not make people enter byte codes or escape characters. If, however, you'd actually like a lot of people to use it so you can become rich and famous, then there is absolutely no doubt that you will need to go WYSIWYG.
Wikitext/markdown/whatever has never caught on with the masses and never will. I'm a programmer myself and I hate the stuff. I have enough syntax to keep straight as it is and everybody has their own flavor. You will never get anywhere without at least the option for a WYSIWYG toolbar.
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