Re: [Sml] text/plain and SML data display

[Steffen Nurpmeso <[e-mail]>]

Arnt Gulbrandsen wrote in
 <[e-mail]>:
 |I'm guessing that the majority preference in the AAON would be to send a 
 |multipart/alternative with augmented text/html as the first alternative \
 |and 
 |text/pan as the second.

For your possible interest, plain text can contain anchors and
URLs via OSC-8 links.  Yes, these are control sequences in ECMA-48
spirit.  But the next version of the less(1) pager will include
"full support" for them.  Just like for SGR colour sequences.
Ah.  Funnily v650 was "released" two days ago.  Anyway, with that
version onward, you can use "less -R" as your pager, and navigate
in monsters like [1], via [NUMBER]^O^N, [NUMBER]^O^P, and
open/follow the currently selected link with ^O^O; also with
mouse, shall you have this on a terminal.  Mr. Nudelman
implemented it a bit differently, and so currently it does not
have functionality to highlight all OSC-8 links on the screen, but
i think many terminals do that by themselves (likely xterm, maybe
kterm etc; the one i use, st, does not).
Anyway, you can directly, without doing anything, follow man: (and
file) links, and such, which gives you an interactive experience
on the terminal, just like a browser, almost.
I think what i want to say: HTML is one thing, but plain text can
have the capability to do quite a bit by itself, if so desired.

  [1] https://ftp.sdaoden.eu/code-mailx-1.cat
  ^ Sorry for this, but it is the monster example

 |Display subsystems that support text/pan will display that because it's 
 |last and one is always to use the last supported alternative; processing 
 |subsystems that look for SML won't support text/pan, will therefore \
 |be left 
 |with text/html as the last supported alternative, will look there, and use 
 |the structured information they find.
 |
 |We in the AAON like to describe this as a win-win situation and _totally_ 
 |in tune with the design of MIME. "Let's call it an unanticipated feature", 
 |as the great language designer answered when someone reported a bug in his 
 |language and the bug looked useful.
 |
 |Arnt
 |
 |(PS: would you like to become a member of the AAON, the Association of 
 |Arrogant Nerds, of which I am the founder?)

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)