[spec] comments on the proposed gemini spec revisions

[Oliver Simmons]

On Mon, 11 Oct 2021 at 09:12, Omar Polo <op at omarpolo.com> wrote:
> 1. whitespace after gemtext elements
>
> I don't have strong opinion on this, but on the other hand I don't see a
> real motivation to require a space in your post nor in the gitlab
> discussion.  Whitespaces should not be mandatory if not strictly
> required to separate fields (like in a link line) in my opinion at
> least.  But yes, I do always write '# hello there' and not '#hello
> there'.

As someone who's making a basic gemini client, having the whitespace
makes it alot simpler, you can just split the line on the space and do
a `switch` on the first part.
Not having a space means you'd have to test if the line starts with
different things, which would be very annoying and slower in most
cases.

Having the whitespace is easier for clients, and also looks better.
I see no downside to enforcing it in the spec (a SHOULD or MUST).

> Taking this in slightly OT direction: in what manner should client
> authors experiment with extensions in their clients?  I know there isn't
> a reply, if the project is mine I can do the hell I want with it, and
> since most (all?) clients are free software I can take an existing one
> and modify the hell out of it, and I'm grateful for this.
>
> I know also the "don't extend gemini" mantra, and I repeat myself too.

Clients can do what the hell they like IMO, as long as things that
transmit over the net obey the spec.
So gemtext is pretty unlimited, but making protocol requests is
strictly limited.
Something like replacing `---` is entirely a client-side thing and
affects no one but the reader.

The spec is a baseline for a minimum working thing, there's a reason
alot of it is "SHOULD''/"MAY" rather than "MUST".

-Oliver Simmons (GoodClover)