commit 32ccbd7c9c6e9cc28f6a3fdaa7db933227fa10d8 (patch)
parent 8ba21a2421b8ab2c2857d56ee119dfc1a3dc9104
Author: Alex Karle <alex@alexkarle.com>
Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2021 14:08:02 -0500
gopher: Add phlog entry on the archive-ability of plaintext
Just some afternoon thoughts!
Diffstat:
2 files changed, 44 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)
diff --git a/gopher/phlog/012.txt b/gopher/phlog/012.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,43 @@
+Optimizing for Archival
+-----------------------
+Sun Nov 21 13:56:35 EST 2021
+
+---
+Written on my desktop while Jennie mod-podge's the puzzle
+we put together last weekend for framing.
+---
+
+If you've read any of my previous posts, it's no secret that
+one of the reasons I'm really enjoying phlogging is the
+plaintext content. I wanted to call out one of my favorite
+side-effects of plaintext entries: ease of archiving.
+
+Browsing gopherspace, it's clear that plaintext is among the
+most suitable formats for long term storage. Look at quux.org's
+treasure trove of historical documents. Or all of the IETF
+RFC's. Plain ascii-encoded files seem to be a guaranteed way
+to ensure your content is not only readable in the future,
+but easy to archive for that future.
+
+This is actually one of my biggest beefs with mdoc(7). It's
+a great semantic language, but it's not really that legible
+in its raw form. It's a safe bet for archival--given that so
+much of our historical manuals are written in it, it seems
+that interpreters like mandoc(1) will be around for a while;
+however, it's still dependent on external tools for proper
+viewing.
+
+Same with HTML--you need a browser or interpreter to read it.
+
+I think this is one of the strengths of markdown--even in a
+post-HTML future, the markdown source will be archived and
+readable. However, I kind-of like explicitly scoping the
+content to _just_ ascii and not focusing on *any* other
+presentation format other than the source. It's all too common
+to get markdown files that are illegible because the author
+cares more about the way GitHub renders it than the way
+it looks in an editor (unwrapped lines, massive amounts of
+image URLs, non-prettified tables, etc).
+
+I take comfort knowing I'll be able to `cat` this file
+two decades from now and still remember what I was thinking :)
diff --git a/gopher/phlog/index.gph b/gopher/phlog/index.gph
@@ -14,6 +14,7 @@
[0|Atom Feed|/phlog/atom.xml|server|port]
+[0|[2021-11-21] Optimizing for Archival|/phlog/012.txt|server|port]
[0|[2021-11-21] Lowering Barriers to Writing|/phlog/011.txt|server|port]
[0|[2021-11-17] Adding a Feed for the Phlog|/phlog/010.txt|server|port]
[0|[2021-11-15] Going Live on the Weblog|/phlog/009.txt|server|port]
