
Improved commenting with Markdown - Amorymeltzer
https://github.com/blog/2097-improved-commenting-with-markdown
======
manachar
Seems that Github is recognizing that more and more non-dev types are
interacting with Github in various ways and are providing tools to help them
out.

I suppose it's fine, and certainly easier than teaching newbies Github-
flavored markdown.

One complaint: Using the aA icon to hide the different headers menu. Headers
are not just "bigger text" as the icon indicates. They should use a different
icon that indicates its for headers and has nothing directly to do with font-
size.

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browseatwork
Is this why GitHub unicorned for a bit yesterday? I'm looking forward to the
engineering blog post talking about what went wrong and how they fixed it.

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rmchugh
Disappointed that Github still haven't responded to the issues raised in the
open letter a few weeks ago.

~~~
nikolay
Yeah, that's pure arrogance! Time to reconsider GitLab or Bitbucket!

~~~
rglover
Not responding to group shaming isn't arrogance.

~~~
nikolay
It wasn't shaming, it was a voice of desperation! GitHub is an arrogant bunch.
And I'm not saying this only because of the "Dear GitHub"!

~~~
digbyloftus
Writing a public letter to a business (of which you are not a customer) as if
your problems are theirs to fix, is one of the most textbook example of
"exaggerated sense of one's own importance" that I could possibly imagine.
Those people were, and are, clearly not very important to Github at all.

~~~
nikolay
Well, those people _are_ very important. If GitHub was a platform only of paid
customers without the plethora of open-source projects by non-payings
customers (which are important customers still even if they don't directly
contribute to the bottom line), it wouldn't have a commercial success in this
magnitude either.

Anyway, it's an observation, I don't have data to back it up, but I see a lot
of new projects actually starting with Bitbucket these days.

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mofle
Power users can remove it by putting this in their user style:

    
    
        .toolbar-commenting{display:none !important;}
    

Use with e.g.
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/stylish/fjnbnpbmke...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/stylish/fjnbnpbmkenffdnngjfgmeleoegfcffe)

~~~
rasz_pl
Power users? how is disabling few icons empowering anyone? The space is still
there, blank and wasted. Do you scratch all the button/knob markings off in
your car because you are a power driver?

~~~
shampine
Power users, power buttons, power driving, power washing, power living. To
each their own. If he wants to remove buttons, so be it.

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cthulhujr
>Have feedback on this post? Let @github know on Twitter.

This probably isn't new, but I just noticed it. For shame.

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kingosticks
Using github regularly was what got me to learn markdown and I'm very grateful
as I've found it useful in lots of different places. I'm not convinced this
change was really worth doing, especially if it was at the expense of features
people have been asking for.

~~~
nilliams
I don't think that the belief that feature X was created at the expense of
feature Y is a reasonable assumption. Who knows how this feature came about?
It could have been a Githubber's 20% project, or weekend hack project, or
largely down to a 3rd party library.

~~~
kingosticks
I didn't assume it was, I hoped it wasn't.

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gravypod
This seems much harder to implement than a comment rating system so we don't
see +1 spam.

~~~
venning
I doubt that. This update is entirely client-side, while a rating system
requires data management server-side in addition to the user interface
elements.

That doesn't mean ratings are difficult, just more difficult than this.

Besides, the developers in place to build this update may not overlap at all
with the developers in place to implement new rating functionality.

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detaro
Does anyone know a similar component/library to do something like this on your
own website. Most I've seen try to build a full Word-like editor, without the
markdown aspect?

~~~
WorldMaker
I've not used it myself (yet), but Prose Mirror
([http://prosemirror.net/](http://prosemirror.net/)) is the one I have
bookmarked and has been featured here on HN in the past and seems to be very
full featured and from the demos it seems flexible everything from the full
WYSIWYG-style editor that some users may want to this sort of simple toolbar
over a Markdown field.

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nikolay
Fugly and distracting!

~~~
nikolay
Why the downvotes?! Okay, I use some strong language, because while Bitbucket
is introducing Projects [0], GitHub is working on bells and whistles! In the
time of Medium.com, we know there are better ways to allow formatting
controls!

I understand GitHub is in desperation to go beyond programmers, but this is a
ridiculous expansion goal!

[0]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10950730](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10950730)

~~~
Freak_NL
> Why the downvotes?!

Probably because of the needless profanity and lack of an explanation for your
statement (my best guess, I did not downvote you).

> bells and whistles

These kind of features are completely unnecessary for developers, but are
useful for the less tech-savvy team members. The markup is not hidden, so it
provides a way to learn some basic MarkDown (good!). That in turn improves
communication, which improves your product.

Beware of the fallacy of believing that because someone finds the time to
polish their product or add seemingly simple features, they don't invest
resources in more complex features or research and development. These are not
mutually exclusive goals, even though resources are by definition limited.

~~~
nikolay
It's a pipe dream - only technical people use GitHub and this is just a
distraction. Instead of trying to keep their core audience in a world with a
growing number of alternatives, they are trying to do the impossible - make
this a Google Drive. That's why I on purpose used "fugly", because I'm tired
of relying so much on unreliable people. But this will change.

~~~
macintux
Many technical companies use GitHub, and many employees of same are not
particularly technical.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your
philosophy.

~~~
nikolay
Any data to back your bold statement with?

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wilg
Where was your data to back up when you said "only technical people" use
GitHub?

~~~
nikolay
Where's your data to back your unpopular statement? Mine is the obvious
conclusion based on wide observation since the early days of GitHub till now.

