Easy XHTML For Humans = Textile

Check out the coolest new thing! This markup language, rather– a presentational, formatting syntax (for typing *one thing*, to have it _published_ in a particular visual style) capable of converting simple, readily available keyboard symbols into valid HTML.

This special formatting syntax, known as Textile, is targeted toward the countless web citizens who, while they are active in the most populated corners of the web (maintaining blogs, participating in community forums, social networking sites, etc.), they have little to no functional knowledge of HTML, XML, and XHTML, the basic– if not currently most common– building blocks required for publishing web content.

How is it that people, without knowledge of HTML, have been able to publish so much of it? The answer is in preformatted content management systems, like Google’s Blogger, or in the bbcode common to forums, where simple syntax is used to change text styles, enabling HTMilliterate people to breathe some life into chunks of otherwise plain text. From what I’ve seen of Textile, it looks as though the doors to web publishing will open a bit wider to empower more users, with more options, a less cumbersome syntax than bbcode, where a single character is used to indicate bold or italic type (such as the asterisk [*], underscore [ _ ], etc.) instead of the rather bulky, square-bracket, letter, square-bracket (i.e. [i]italic[/i] [b]bold[/b] ).

Maybe you don’t find this to be all that fascinating. Maybe you are excited, and eager to learn more. Please don’t let me hold you any longer! Try the Textile sample page. It just might open the door to your next web publishing project, while it takes care of writing valid code, served up in attractive style in what may be the most user-friendly option for the non-html-skilled web citizens.