Proposed table syntax

[Shaun Inman]

I was formatting some plain text today for internal documentation at work
and realized that I have a pretty regular format when it comes to
presenting tabular data as plain text. I'm not suggesting (or demanding)
that you implemented it, just throwing it out there.

Here's a simple two column, table heads on the left:

	Label One......:	Some data
	Label Two......:	Additional data
	Label Three....:	More data

Then there's a table with table heads across the top row:

	First Name		Last Name		URL
	==============================================================
	Jeffrey			Zeldman			http://www.zeldman.com/
	John			Gruber			http://www.daringfireball.net/
	Joshua			Davis			http://www.joshuadavis.com/

I think both could be easily sniffed out by a regexp--maybe not by myself
but for someone with John's talent...hehe--and follow Markdown's "looks
like what it is" philosophy. The only potential problem is the tabbed
indent conflicting with the existing code block syntax (something that I
wouldn't even suggest sacrificing).

Any thoughts or are plans already in the works for something like this?

Cheers,
Shaun

..........................

Shaun Inman
http://www.shauninman.com/