spaces and newlines before list markers (was: evolving the spec)

[John Gruber]

On Mar 2, 2008, at 7:49 PM, Aristotle Pagaltzis wrote:


> This is actually my second biggest complaint with Markdown. As I

> understand, John was originally going to allow numbered lists to

> start at numbers other than 1, but then discovered that the HTML4

> WG labelled the `start` attribute of lists deprecated, so he

> removed this feature.

>

> I find the WG’s decision utterly baffling and wrong-headed. *How

> on Earth* is that information presentational?!

>

> So while I don’t disagree with the basic desire to output valid

> HTML, I think John’s decision in this one case was mistaken. IMO,

> in this one case Markdown should do what is sensible, validation

> be damned.


Agreed. This will work correctly in the next version. Plus, the  
"start" attribute is in HTML5 for <ol>. Back when I was working on  
Markdown 1.0, I was completely under the spell of the W3C's "strict"  
specs.

-J.G.