[pmwiki] Re: [Pmwiki-users] problems with returns and paragraphs

[Bernhard Weichel in pmwiki-users]

Hi,

I would like to raise the following questions
(theoretical background at the end of the mail if someone is interested).

Is there a chance to render

>>-------

!!hola
give it a try

this is a paragraph

and this is the second paragraph

----------<<

to

<p />
<h2>hola</h2>
<p>give it a try</p>
<p>this is a paragraph</p>
<p>and this is the second paragraph</p>
<p />
<pre > and some preformatted text
    with preformatted text

</pre>
<p>and a paragraph</p>
<p>another paragraph</p>
<p />

instead of

<p /><h2>hola</h2>
<p />give it a try
<p />this is a paragraph
<p />and this is the second paragraph
<p /><pre > and some preformatted text
    with preformatted text

</pre>and a paragraph
<p />another paragraph
<p /><p />

I a agree, that the current rendering is xhtml compliant.
But only by law but not by spirit.

The first rendering would definitely give more options for CSS based
styling.

--Bernhard

Background:

PmWiki generates the XHTML paragraph always as empty elements.

<P /> instead of <P> what it was at HTML.

<P> in HTML did not indicate the space between two paragraphs.
It was rather a minimized <P> ... </P> sequence.
In the SGML version of HTML the declaration was

   <!element P - o (%inline;) >

This means that the endtag can be omitted. In XML it is:

  <!ELEMENT p %Inline;>

which means that the endtag must not be omitted.

The context of paragraphs is %flow;

<!ENTITY % block
     "p | %heading; | div | %lists; | %blocktext; | fieldset | table">

<!ENTITY % Block "(%block; | form | %misc;)*">

<!-- %Flow; mixes block and inline and is used for list items etc. -->
<!ENTITY % Flow "(#PCDATA | %block; | form | %inline; | %misc;)*">


This shows the intention, that paragraphs should be marked up explicitly
and not as empty paragraphs messed into text.