[[!meta title="Updates on Org Mode maintenance"]] [[!meta copyright="Copyright © 2024 Ihor Radchenko"]] [[!inline pages="internal(2024/info/org-update-nav)" raw="yes"]] # The Future of Org Ihor Radchenko [[!inline pages="internal(2024/info/org-update-before)" raw="yes"]] # Discussion ## Questions and answers - Q:\<\_viz\> Q: Is the track-changes item about the org-element parser? \[10:34\] - A:Yes - \ Moreover, track-changes has been developed with my input specifically aimed to make sure that it can support org-element use case. See [https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi](https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi) /bugreport.cgi?bug=70077 - Q: Could you please keep IRC alive? I prefer it to Matrix. Thx. - A: I am mostly live on IRC from mobile (via Revolution IRC) and should be able to see most of the messages. Except when my mobile phone does not have good internet connection or is discharged - I got a suggestion to use chat.sr.ht as a bouncer. I will look into it to make the connection more reliable. (It is not bad now, but I do miss messages once in a while). - Q: Is there any plan for adding support for other modalities of notes like handwritten,  audio, etc.? Would that be interesting to the community? It will definitely be useful for me. - A: Might want to look into jkitchin's repos (possibly via tesseract) - tesseract + image paste: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGGAr1AWkTc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGGAr1AWkTc)  - John Kitchin \[Youtube\] (2021) scimax - #drawing screenshot, tesseract, pngpaste and ox-clip - For audio, I do not know much. My bookmarks contain a couple of possibly related items: - [https://git.sr.ht/\~lxsameer/orion](https://git.sr.ht/~lxsameer/orion) - [https://github.com/rksm/org-ai?tab=readme-ov-file#setting-up-speech-input\--output](https://github.com/rksm/org-ai?tab=readme-ov-file#setting-up-speech-input--output) - You can use attachment and images to paste. - \ In terms of actually adding support for hadwritten notes/audio, it is not 100% clear what that support would consitute. Tooling to convert images/sound to text would probably not be appropriate for Org mode. It would be better done as a separate package(s). Then, using such tooling could be supported, but again, it is not clear what such a support would constitute. - \"Would that be interesting to the community?\" Go and ask ;) Just write about your idea in details to the mailing list and you will get feedback. What I can tell is that this topic does not surface frequently as far as I am aware. - Q: I spent some time writing a library for myself which involved working with org files. One thing I struggled with was finding a good source of reference code which demonstrated idiomatic usage. Is there/could there be a resource with which to recommend particularly well written codebases for review by others? - A: Ideally, Org codebase should be such a place. Unfortunately, not every part of Org is a good reference for others (I hope to keep pushing for improvements). - Decent references could be ox.el, many ob-\* backends, and ox-\* backends. But I cannot suggest something definite without knowing what exactly you tried to do. There are many APIs in Org mode. - What might be useful is [https://orgmode.org/manual/Hacking.html](https://orgmode.org/manual/Hacking.html) and [https://orgmode.org/worg/dev/index.html](https://orgmode.org/worg/dev/index.html) - Maybe also [https://alphapapa.github.io/org-almanac/#development](https://alphapapa.github.io/org-almanac/#development) - Q: WRT IETF standardization, have you looked at Karl Voit's OrgDown?  - A: Lot of pushback to this idea on the mailing-list. - A large part of it was about naming - Some links: - [https://list.orgmode.org/2021-11-28T20-44-37@devnull.Karl-Voit.at/](https://list.orgmode.org/2021-11-28T20-44-37@devnull.Karl-Voit.at/) - My followup: [https://list.orgmode.org/87tufnbj1w.fsf@localhost/](https://list.orgmode.org/87tufnbj1w.fsf@localhost/) - Despite pushback, Karl\'s idea did align with our IETF idea and with one of the point I make in the presentation about making life easier for non-Emacs apps. - See [https://list.orgmode.org/orgmode/2022-10-17T22-36-38@devnull.Karl-Voit.at/](https://list.orgmode.org/orgmode/2022-10-17T22-36-38@devnull.Karl-Voit.at/) - I will quote Bastien here: - [https://list.orgmode.org/orgmode/87fsfl7g01.fsf@bzg.fr/](https://list.orgmode.org/orgmode/87fsfl7g01.fsf@bzg.fr/) - What occurred to me while rereading this thread is that definining a - syntax for a IETF RFC on an Org mimetype probably needs to be done not - just by this Emacs Org-mode community, but by bringing together other - \"consumers\" of .org files, from ecosystems outside of Emacs. - Such a collective work could lead to define what subset of the Org - syntax is useful as the corner-stone for .org files everywhere - which - is what you rightfully brought up with \"Orgdown\". - If successful, such a process could end up in defining the minimal and - official \"Org syntax\" while allowing implementations (like the one for - Emacs org-mode) to supercharge this syntax if deemed useful. - Perhaps TEC is right and we will end up having the minimal syntax - being the one we currently use for Org-mode: we\'ll see. - Q: About a year ago we discussed switching GNU documentation from texinfo to org. Do you still consider this? - A: We don't want to complicate org syntax to adjust to the texinfo markup. - ...But we want to keep org's syntax generic so that it can be customized to support the necessary Texinfo constructs - I detailed my vision in [https://list.orgmode.org/875xwqj4tl.fsf@localhost/](https://list.orgmode.org/875xwqj4tl.fsf@localhost/) - apart from Texinfo parity, the idea is to help addressing various syntax edge cases by providing aliases to the existing markup elements ## Notes     \ Nice to see mobile apps actively being considered when talking about\                 org :D \[10:29\]\ - \ Transient integration in org will be a very welcome -                              improvement! Being able to save the transient state on -                              org-export would be very nice indeed - \ fun fact: Transient did take some inspiration from Org\'s menus - \ tarsius: Oh, I did not know this! - \ From which menus exactly, those implemented by Nicolas for the -              exporter? - \ Not any specific menus but the \"dim unreachable commands, when the -                     user typed an incomplete key sequence\" feature. - \ love to hear how folks in emacs real approach project development as social endeavors to a significant degree - \ Another mobile app that understands org-markdown is ZettelNotes ([https://znotes.thedoc.eu.org/](https://znotes.thedoc.eu.org/)) - \ It is not the only one missed. For a reason. I did not find source code. - \ Ah ok, that is fair. - \There is a Ruby parser too, in the Guthub renderer - Right. It is also listed at [https://orgmode.org/tools.html](https://orgmode.org/tools.html) (alongside with Pandoc) - \ As an org user but someone who is not familiar with development -                              (and has no context on org\'s direction before Ihor\'s -                              stewardship), I\'m really excited about the priorities being -                              expressed in this talk :) Thanks \[10:47\] - \ another great (and absolute core to me) app with org-mode support (respectively org files are at the core of it) for iOS devices is: beorg [https://www.beorgapp.com/](https://www.beorgapp.com/)  - \ Really encouraging stuff, thanks :D \[11:02\] - \ Thank you yantar92\`  - \ Thank you for this wonderful talk! - \ We appreciate all the work being done - \ really enjoying this talk as a long time user who hasn\'t ever really -                 thought about how org mode gets developed (much less contributed) - For audio transcription, I use Speech Note (offline) and copy the text to orgmode - It\'s great to see Carsten, Bastien and Ihor together. I run my life with orgmode, so we owe you guys a lot :) - \ I think a huge part of Org Mode is workflow, and that\'s both highly individual and highly social - we learn about what\'s possible by hearing about how other people do things [[!inline pages="internal(2024/info/org-update-after)" raw="yes"]] [[!inline pages="internal(2024/info/org-update-nav)" raw="yes"]]