[PD] [pd META] metadata format WAS: pd 0.43 branch with the new GUI code

[Frank Barknecht]

Hallo,
Hans-Christoph Steiner hat gesagt: // Hans-Christoph Steiner wrote:

> On Aug 27, 2009, at 3:47 AM, Frank Barknecht wrote:
>
>> Hallo,
>> Hans-Christoph Steiner hat gesagt: // Hans-Christoph Steiner wrote:
>>> How about Outlet0, etc?  Its really just a unique ID, so once parsed 
>>> the
>>> tag could be displayed as whatever.
>>
>> Actually I think, "Outlet 0" is easier to parse with Pd: [route  
>> Outlet]-[route
>> 0 1 2 3]. Having a separator like the ":" makes reading easier. I  
>> guess, for
>> Pd parsing padding that with spaces would help and not hinder  
>> readability that
>> much.
>
> [route outlet0 outlet1 outlet2 outlet3]

Okay, you got me here. :)

> Can you give some examples of why [pd META] needs multiple-word tags?  

For terms with multiple words like "frequency modulation". I know, I need them,
believe me.

> I 
> mean its nice sometimes, but there are very well established tag  
> interfaces that use space-separated tags.  Since this text is in Pd  
> patches, it should follow Pd syntax rules, since Pd users already know  
> them well, unless there is a strong reason to diverge.  With only a few 
> exceptions, the function in an object box is the first word in a  
> space-separated list.  In a message, the first word of a space-separated 
> list is the selector.
>
> What's more needed is a quoting mechanism.  Space-separated tags usually 
> use "two words" quotes to join them.  But that's a bigger issue in Pd...

Yeah, that would solve my problems as well. 

But let me repeat: Unlike "META", "REFERENCE" is meant to be documentation for
the user, so readability is more important than parsability, and parsability
outside of Pd to us is more important than parsability inside of Pd. The latter
would be a bonus, but I won't sacrifice readability for it. We're already
making concessions in that area, e.g. we have single comments for all the
messages types an inlet accepts. (See "Inlet 1" in the attachement.) Pd syntax
rules are fine, but English syntax rules where spaces separate words, not
key:value pairs, are more important here.

I also don't like "Outlet0" of a similar reason: It's not well readable,
0 and O look too similar etc. so the two words should be separated just like
everything else in English.

Attached is a comparison of the possibilities we've talked about. I like the
first one best, which probably will get dashes in the Tags field as a result of
our discussion. The second one in the upper right and the third one are
okayish, but the "META"-version on the lower right to me looks like it is
written for parsers, not for humans.

Ciao
-- 
Frank