Since Jason got confused, multiword tags means tags with many words. Syntax can be different. If anyone missed that - they are already used. Not just in Diaspora, but in Twitter and any other place which uses tags. Examples were given above.
The reason to use them is quite straightforward - sometimes you need to use phrase as a tag, and one word isn’t sufficient.
From disagree to strong block due to author acting hostile
Who was being hostile here? You started completely off-topic and unprofessional ad hominem attacks in the discussion when you said:
Such a comedian, very funny.
and when you were asked to stop trolling you call that hostile? Be responsible please. Derailing the discussion with personal attacks is what not helping any productive results.
Those who disagree, please state your reasons in order to come up with better alternatives.
Because it’s a bad idea.
The proposal is based on the complaint that there are currently too many ways to enter a multi-word tag, but proposes yet another way to do it.
Better to change the parsing of tags so that, just as results containing both #mytag and #MyTag currently appear in a search for either of them, results for #my-tag and #my_tag would also appear (along with any variants of these) in a search for any of those variants.
The proposal is based on the complaint that there are currently too many ways to enter a multi-word tag, but proposes yet another way to do it.
@goob : That’s just part of the issue. Another part of the issue is poor readability of tags without whitespace, which for some reason most here simply dismiss as irrelevant. However it makes them simply noise which distracts from reading the post, ranging from small annoyance to making the whole thing highly unreadable.
For this reason for example I always avoid using tags in the middle of the post, and just make a list of them in the end. But a lot of people mix tags with the body of the post in my experience.
The hashtag is used in the same way everywhere, a hashtag is used in “camel” mode
I saw plenty of hashtags used with dashes or snake notation. While Goob’s idea to drop them during search will help partially, readability of such tags displayed in the post will remain very poor.
Hashtags with whitespace may be useless to you but it’s not to others. There’s no sense in blocking something that really does have legitimate use just because you don’t want it. You’re not being asked to write the code, just if there’s a legitimate reason it should not happen. So far, there are no legitimate concerns.
On a more technical mean : it will just be a pain in the ass to process. Algorithms to extract classic hashes extists. No one to extract hashes w/ whitespaces. So we’ll have to code it. No way…
. Another part of the issue is poor readability of tags without whitespace
See Jonne’s opinion : hashtags does not exist to be readable. They exist to agrgregate posts with subjects.
There’s no sense in blocking something that really does have legitimate use just because you don’t want it.
Not just that. I really don’t care who want’s it or not. I just strongly believe this will be harmful
Indeed, they are clearly not useless for everyone. So far concerns which were voiced were:
About #1 - I’m not sure it’s any more confusing than using hyperlinks with whitespace which are used everywhere. People don’t look confused about it.
#2 - I’m not sure really how it affects the usage if they are categories or not. Tags are used for search and anchoring certain posts together. And they are actively used for that purpose in phrases forms already (for example - “free software”, “open source” etc.). So however we defined their theoretical idea, right now we are talking about practical usage which is already prevalent.
#3: Removing proliferation completely is impossible - users can always come up with incompatible ways - you can’t hold user’s hands about it. But what you can do is providing an easy to read standard option.
Algorithms to extract classic hashes extists. No one to extract hashes w/ whitespaces
What, you say that parser for #{…} is much more complex than parser for #xyz? It doesn’t look to be more complex or resource hungry. The other proposal (from Chris) was indeed introducing more complexity because of that syntax specifics. But whitespace alone - doesn’t.
hashtags does not exist to be readable.
That was answered already. What matters is how they are used in practice, not how we define them in theory. And practice contradicts that. I.e. unreadable tags are used all around in the middle of posts which implies that you have to read them.
So ignoring that and saying - “hey, they don’t follow the definition, so who cares” doesn’t really help anything.
Not just that. I really don’t care who want’s it or not. I just strongly believe this will be harmful
Can you elaborate please how it can be harmful?
I guess, we soon will need some regularities on when and who and how can someone block a voting, how long the voting-duration should be and that code-details shouldn’t be part of the decision. I think, “we cannot reuse other’s people’s code” (see Augier’s “So we’ll have to code it. No way…”) is a bad argument to reject a proposal. See, we are working on Diaspora and want to change the world; it is obvious that we can’t achieve that just by using code of other people.
Nevertheless it is my own opinion that this feature is not really necessary.
What, you say that parser for #{…} is much more complex than parser for #xyz?
I say that we do not do this job by ourselves currently. It is done by an external gem. So, yes, it is much more complex if we have to do this by ourselves…
And practice contradicts that. I.e. unreadable tags are used all around in the middle of posts which implies that you have to read them.
Seriously, how many posts do you read with very long tags ? In what does it block the message comprehension ? What I say is : hashtags should be next to the text body. Not in it, and obviously not it…
Can you elaborate please how it can be harmful?
It adds work, another confusing syntax, another way to write multi-word tags, meaning another possibility to not find all the posts related to this tag, another incompatibilty with other tools (FB, twitter, red matrix, etc…) other algorithmics problems to solve (how to display it, how to process it, how to add it in databases), etc, etc… And unfortunatly, it does not bring us devs…
Seriously, how many posts do you read with very long tags ? In what does it block the message comprehension
It happens not infrequently. It blocks it in a very simple way - more than often I just stop reading that post and move to the next one.
It adds work, another confusing syntax, another way to write multi-word tags, meaning another possibility to not find all the posts related to this tag, another incompatibilty with other tools
I think all of those concerns were already addressed above. Syntax isn’t confusing (it’s already widely used for hyperlinks) and anyway it’s optional and no one is forced to use it. Search can be adjusted anyway to unify things, similar to what Goob proposed and export to other tools can be addressed on individual basis following their limitations (for example spaces can be stripped and so on). Another way to write which is standard is something that users can be directed to if they aren’t aware. No standard way means you can’t even suggest it properly.
another incompatibilty with other tools (FB, twitter, red matrix, etc…)
#“multi word hashtag” and #multi_word_hashtag can both be used with RedMatrix.
some regularities on when and who and how can someone block a voting,
A block is only a No vote, we voted on that early on when we started using Loomio. It doesn’t block anything, we just calculate no+block votes against yes.
#OccupyWallStreet works fine without spaces.
I only see disadvantages for using something like #(Occupy Wall Street)
Or should we support using images/soundstreams etc as tags too?
Actually yes. There was a proposal already to support audio and video tags. Simplicity which reduces usability is not a good thing at all.
You want us to vote down your proposal all over again? Ok then…
I think specifying a syntax for tags is unnecessary and not a good use of people’s time.
I guess I just don’t understand why whitespace is such a big deal. If you’re worried about appealing to “non-technical” people, anything you come up with is going to be just as “technical” as using camelCase or hyphens or whatever. As I stated earlier, this is a non-issue with smart search algorithms, which is something you want to have anyway.
@Perig Gouanvic , what does this have to do with “evolution of the semantic web”? Could you expand on this a little more?
