Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Syntax differentiation in editing window

Questions posed by this RfC

 * 1) Should the text editor have a function to color syntax specifically associated with references (i.e. all text within tags, including tags) so it can be differentiated from other text within the article?
 * 2) Should this functionality be turned on by default for all users?
 * 3) Should other forms of syntax be uniquely colored as well (e.g. headers, Wikilinks, infoboxes, etc.)?

Prior discussion
The proposal, in a more basic form, was previously discussed at the village pump per this discussion. A total of 14 editors explicitly supported the proposal and zero editors opposed it. It was also suggested that this be brought to RfC to get a wider response from the community. A unique project page was created because implementation of this function will affect nearly all editors who use the text editor.

Comments from the proposer
The motivation behind this proposal comes from my own participation at The Teahouse, an initiative by the WMF to engage new users in an effective and inviting manner. Many such questions I have encountered there deal with the confusion of trying to get references into articles or how to edit articles with many references in them already (e.g. ,,, ). The other place I've encountered difficulty in the referencing system is the new user feedback dashboard. This particular proposal actually came from a user who had a bad experience and suggested that it would be incredibly helpful to create a different font color in the text editor for references and regular text.

One other note, there is already a program by Remember the dot (found here) that highlights many different kinds of syntax that could be used for this proposal. However, some editors expressed that its current state would be problematic because 1) It highlights too much text at once and some editors have expressed that this might be confusing, 2) Making changes would require customization of the program, which some (but not all) users would be prepared to do, and 3) The program is only reliably functional in Firefox, and has unreliable or no functionality in other web browsers (see known issues), and 4) Computers with insufficient memory may find editing to be a sluggish task, and when a lot of highlighting is required, the program terminates. Still, I use the syntax highlighter, and to be quite frank, I think it's nothing less than amazing, so I think it can be repurposed or implemented in some form. I, Jethrobot drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 23:33, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Differentiating reference text
Rendering reference text in a different color would have multiple benefits for all editors, regardless of their degree of experience with Wikipedia. First, new editors creating a new article who are unfamiliar with reference text would quickly be able to differentiate between explicitly displayed text and reference syntax. Second, new editors who edit existing articles would be able to more quickly parse and identify sections of text-- this would make articles more accessible and less daunting to new editors. Third, for experienced editors who are editing articles with hundreds of references (e.g. Barack Obama), the same idea applies: Parsing through the article, tweaking references, and finding specific sections or sentences would be much easier. Some editors at the village pump discussion also considered that implementing this function may increase editing participation due to ease of use of the editing interface. Furthermore, the function would be implemented as a gadget, and could be turned on and off by individual users under their preferences.

Support: we should differentiate reference text

 * Yes, I think this would help. (Or we could have everyone use list-defined references.) Thank goodness that the VisualEditor is coming out (somewhat) soon. That will make it much easier to add references. David  1217  What I've done 23:51, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - great helpful idea, and will help identify references to everyone, not just new editors. -- Activism  1234  00:25, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - This would help all editors. Staring at a paragraph and trying to relate it to the one you were just looking at before you clicked "edit" is often very difficult. &mdash; Cup co  00:27, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * There's a reason why most IDEs and decent text editors have syntax highlighting. MER-C 00:33, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Definitely a high priority. Among many problems, I've often seen good references get broken (accidentally) because subsequent editors don't understand the syntax. Shooterwalker (talk) 00:49, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support It would ease editing.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:03, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. No reason to do without the benefits of colour vision, which has evolved over the aeons just because it enhances detection of features in otherwise undifferentiated foliage – whether of leaves or of text ☺. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Noetica (talk • contribs) 22:33, 20 September 2012‎
 * Lol. Foraging through the jungle of wikitext foliage our fearless hunter spots the reference and aims carefully... --Timeshifter (talk) 05:25, 22 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Support. I would really like this functionality to be available. Reasons as above. &bull; &bull; &bull; Peter (Southwood) (talk): 05:25, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. Especially helpful for new editors. Personally, I think it would be better to extend the colour change to other markup which will not simply appear as test in the finished page; "'' ,like this . It should be an extremely simple and routine edit. Currently it's not, and this feature would help. Kilopi (talk) 22:07, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - Strong, strong support, actually. I was just thinking a day or two ago how much easier life would be when I was wading through a massive paragraph overstuffed with reference templates if all the ref text was in red. BTW, make sure the feature works for those of us who use the system rather than reference templates. Carrite (talk) 02:30, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. This is a no-brainer. Why was it not done long ago? And don't hold your breath waiting on a visual editor. Look at Wikia and its neverending problems with its visual editor. I have edited a longtime at Wikia and, like many editors, I have turned off the visual editor in my preferences since it is so buggy. --Timeshifter (talk) 05:25, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Because it doesn't work. -— Isarra ༆ 06:47, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * My question was "why was it not done long ago?" Your answer is illogical. A logical answer might be that it had not been created yet. But even that would not be entirely accurate. There is this: User:Remember the dot/Syntax highlighter. It highlights much more than just reference syntax. It was discussed in the Village Pump discussion too. Some people in that discussion tested it. So there is something that works partially right now. --Timeshifter (talk) 14:58, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I wish I lived in your magical world where anything is possible and the only constraint is consensus. Now there are workarounds to make this sort of thing work reliably cross-browser, but if you have the resources required to do that, you might as well use them to make a full-out visual editor, which, incidentally, is what the foundation has been doing. Mind, having something of this nature, even when not entirely reliable, would still be useful for a lot of folks. You just asked why it hadn't been done yet. -— Isarra ༆ 16:21, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, I see where the magical thinking lies. Wikia has had a visual editor for years now, and it sucks. See my other comments. A visual editor is vastly more complicated than highlighting some text. --Timeshifter (talk) 00:52, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Of course.  Sandstein   07:35, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support – Support differentiating reference text as a small step. However, I cannot agree with the other proposals per Stephan Schulz's comments as too much differentiation would result in too many colors and too much confusion. --MuZemike 06:19, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - I do a lot of training with new users. When I show them the syntax highlighting that's available from WikEd gadget (that new users are almost certainly not going to find on their own), they find it makes editing a lot easier, and even wonder why the default setting makes wikitext to hard to read. They have to pay the price of WikEd's dozens and dozens of confusing, scary buttons, but that's the choice we offer them at the moment. Anything that helps new users see what's going on and makes wikitext (not just references) less intimidating will result in fewer disillusioned newcomers. MartinPoulter (talk) 17:57, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support I've been using syntax highlighting in  web and code editors, and powerful text  editors for many  years. I  could never understand why  it  was not  implemented for Wikipedia. WE are only  talking  about  making  the references stand out - everyone who  has ever reviewed a big  GA or a FA will  immediately  understand the benefits. Referencing  is the most crucial  operation in  the construction  of a new article -  make it  easier and we'll get  more articles, and more referenced articles from  beginners and old hands alike. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 23:57, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Conditional Support, specifically iff not enabled by default. -- No  unique  names  00:49, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support as nominator, with reasoning above. I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 04:55, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - -- Cheers, Riley Huntley  talk 05:30, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support This will make editing much easier. Garamond Lethe  06:14, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support — kwami (talk) 07:02, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Nice to see Wikipedia be brought up to the same level as every other code/web editor out there. Must be able to turn off if wanted.  Different colours in text does bother or make it hard to read for some people.  Bgwhite (talk) 07:25, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - I like the idea of being able to switch on and off, and having a different color (maybe blue or green) will help determine which text is in the reference and which isn't. WhisperToMe (talk) 07:26, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support, including ability to toggle it off for those that choose. Fairly simple and practical solution that older eyes will appreciate as well. Dennis Brown -  2&cent;    &copy;   Join WER 11:30, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Absolutely great idea. For new editors, for old editors, and to highlight the fact that articles either have or need references. First Light (talk) 03:51, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support per nominator. —Bruce1eetalk 06:37, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. It's one of those things where you think "%$£! me, how did MediaWiki get to be a decade old without acquiring that as an option??" Rd232 talk 09:29, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support I find it increasingly difficult to edit around references since there is no standard format on Wikipedia for them. Ottawahitech (talk) 19:34, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Strong support. Suggest WP:SNOWBALL close of this discussion. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 22:10, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Strong support. Syntax highlighting is now common place in many text editors, even simple ones. It would greatly help Wikipedia; what a great idea! &bull; Jesse V.(talk) 22:15, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support I use rememberthedot's script, and love it when it works. —Quiddity (talk) 03:17, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Would make my editing easier. Would also be very useful if it lets you spot unclosed ref tags, as that seems to be a common mistake for new users, and occasional even from experts. --Colapeninsula (talk) 10:05, 3 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - Makes editing more efficient. --Noleander (talk) 13:09, 4 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. Anything which helps the editor(s) to differentiate between article-text and other text has got to be good.  Pesky  (talk ) 03:30, 6 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support – This would really help when editing content on articles (knowing to ignore refs, for example). –– Anonymouse321 (talk • contribs) 20:07, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - would facilitate editing. Rlendog (talk) 15:30, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support – This can only help. It would save time and lessen the eye strain of differentiating the text from the references, especially in the longer articles. GenQuest (talk) 15:05, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

Oppose: we should not differentiate reference text

 * Oppose - It would be fine to add this type of functionality to an existing gadget like wikEd or as a new standalone gadget, but adding this to the default text editing interface would detract from its simplicity. Edit: Furthermore, I have found wikEd to be incompatible with some browsers on some systems, and therefore turn it on/off depending on my needs. Enabling functionalities that may not be compatible with all browsers would just have the opposite of the desired effect upon newcomers and discourage them. —JmaJeremy  ✆  ✎  21:08, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Do you  drive a car? Imagine a world with traffic lights which instead of colours, had the words STOP, WAIT, GO. Now imagine a world where traffic lights are red,  orange , green .... Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 23:41, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately the cost to install those lights results in a road that sometimes flickers between existing and being washed out entirely. -— Isarra ༆ 00:20, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Somehow I doubt someone (or a group of someones) would force an implementation -- one that would affect pretty much all editors -- that would "wash out" entirely were it to impact a significant number of users. Sure, some bugs might come up, but they already come up with lots of things on Wikipedia and they get dealt with.  This perceived fear of something that hasn't even happened yet seems ungrounded to me.  Or in metaphor terms, why would someone install a fantastically broken traffic light, if they know it's broken beyond repair?  I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 00:41, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Because their boss threw a tantrum and agreeing to it was the only way to get him to shut up. -— Isarra ༆ 04:25, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Of course, we could say that about any new addition that has the potential to carry risk to usability. And if that was our response to potential improvements, it's unlikely Wikipedia would have grown at all.  But I think if enough people, like you and I'm sure many others on here, care about reduced usability from differentiating syntax, risks can be minimized and prevented.  More importantly, the implementation doesn't exist yet.  So asserting that it won't work without an actual program is premature.  I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 04:52, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * My response is what it has been all along: confusion. Why are people voting to turn on something that hasn't been implemented? This particular part of it I certainly have no objections to, however. There was just this shiny metaphor... -— Isarra ༆ 07:32, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * OK. I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree on this one.  I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 07:47, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Isara, these are the kind of negative approaches and comments that stall RfCs and prevent progress on Wikipedia - I suggest first understanding the use of this feature objectively, and worrying yourself about the implementation later, rather than just voting per 'I don't  like it'. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 05:15, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Out of curiosity, would you also say I were standing in the way of Progress were I pointing out that it is premature to vote on how many unicorns every new user gets because despite the fact that we have consensus to give them unicorns, we don't actually have any unicorns yet? -— Isarra ༆ 06:39, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm saying  that  participation  in  RfCs should at least be objective - irrespective of the fact that I think this would be one of the best enhancements to the editing environment at least  since my 7 years here. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 06:45, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Objective is considering all sides of the matter - that includes technical feasibility. -— Isarra ༆ 07:32, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * No, objective is considering the benefits vs disadvantages of the product from the point of view of the editors who would use it, and that  is how new ideas at Wikipedia pass from  the proposal  stage through to  final  implementation. Whether it is technically feasible or not is not up for discussion here - unless you are on the WMF developer team and you're already looking for reasons to  stall the RfC. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 09:16, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I personally feel a certain skepticism that the colors will prove helpful rather than distracting--most other use of color in thWP is glaring and inappropriate. But it is reasonable to let them be tried   DGG ( talk ) 23:28, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Default functionality for all users
Turning on text differentiation for references by default would target newer users who, arguably, would benefit from it most on the basis of accessibility. Newer users may not consider to use it if it is left unchecked as an option under "gadgets" under their preferences. Again, the function could be turned off by any user at any time.

Support: differentiated text for references should be turned on by default

 * This sort of feature is intended to be used by new editors. I doubt most of them will find a feature like this if it is buried in a cluttered gadgets page. David  1217  What I've done 23:53, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - most new editors won't know how to turn on/off gadgets. As the feature is designed with them in mind as well, it should certainly be default for them. However, the option to turn it off should obviously exist. -- Activism  1234  00:27, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support per David1217. &mdash; Cup co  00:28, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I can't think of any sane reason why one would turn this off. All editors benefit from this. MER-C 00:34, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support as a sensible default. New users would benefit the most from this, IMO. And advanced users would easily reject the option if they had one, although I'm not sure why they would need to. Shooterwalker (talk) 01:00, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Start everyone with the good stuff.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:04, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. Absolutely. So many bogglingly useful features go unactivated, such as the better options for watchlists and recent changes (study the details in your preferences, guys ☺). Let this not be among them. An obvious candidate for elevation to default. N oetica Tea? 03:37, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. I see no reason to hide it. Switchable for the inevitable few who won't want it. &bull; &bull; &bull; Peter (Southwood) (talk): 05:28, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. I realise that the kind of people who comment on RfCs tend to be experienced editors who are already comfortable with their UI, and UI change frequently meets strong resistance from established users - but turning it on by default is the only way such a feature would ever reach most new editors, and the experienced editors should easily find where to turn it off if they don't like it. bobrayner (talk) 09:17, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support: as long as this functionality is more helpful to editors with not-so-well-developed computer skills (advanced users can achieve this with external scripts or even external editor), I find the "enabled" default a saner choice. Syntax highlighting won't be disturbing wast majority of editors anyway. — Dmitrij D. Czarkoff (talk•track) 12:29, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - We're trying to get new people to edit and this will help. Carrite (talk) 02:31, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. Another default tool that may help stem the tide of disappearing editors. Or at the very least it will make editing more efficient for the remaining editors since there are more articles and less editors. --Timeshifter (talk) 05:32, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, though perhaps directly accompanied by an easily findable off-switch.  Sandstein   07:36, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. If it makes things easy for newcomers, it would be pointless not having it as the default. MartinPoulter (talk) 17:58, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. Not only for new users, but this would be the most useful editing aid for everyone. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 23:46, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support as nominator with reasoning above. I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 04:56, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. - -- Cheers, Riley Huntley  talk 05:30, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support This is best practice, so yes, I think it should be enabled by default. Garamond Lethe  06:15, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support, as long as our Welcome material is clear on how to turn it off. — kwami (talk) 07:03, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Highlighting references promotes best practice (reliable sources and referencing). Everyone would benefit, especially new editors. First Light (talk) 03:52, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support —Bruce1eetalk 06:40, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Yes this makes perfect sense. This was one of my thoughts before I even read this particular proposal. &bull; Jesse V.(talk) 22:16, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support A wall of ref'd text is overwhelming to many regulars, let alone the newcomers. This will help. —Quiddity (talk) 03:18, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - A great improvement like this should be a default so new users can take advantage of it immediately. --Noleander (talk) 13:10, 4 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. It may be easy to check a checkbox, but I suspect that heaps of users take weeks or months to get around to tweaking their preferences about.  I know I'd racked up an awful lot of edits before I started playing around with preferences!  Pesky  (talk ) 03:33, 6 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support – New users probably would understand references better if they thought, "Why is this highlighted?". –– Anonymouse321 (talk • contribs) 20:08, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - Would be helpful to new users; presumably it would be simple enough to turn off if someone didn't want it. Rlendog (talk) 15:31, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support – Especially helpful for the new users to be in actually referencing their edits. I do worry about loading speeds, however. Will there be a beta test group? or is the plan to implement simultaneously across the board? GenQuest (talk) 14:58, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

Oppose: differentiated text for references should not be turned on by default

 * Oppose on principle. Defaults should be plain, vanilla, and stripped down where feasible.  Checkboxes aren't that hard to use.  -- No  unique  names  00:46, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I note elsewhere that you support this as long as it is not default. I don't think this is going to be enabled yet as default in core MediaWiki. It might be enabled as a default gadget. That means both registered and IP users would see highlighted reference wikitext. Registered users would be able to turn it off since it is a gadget. --Timeshifter (talk) 01:58, 24 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Oppose. There is no implementation yet. How the heck can we decide if it should be turned on by default? What if it causes the editing window to load much more slowly (like wikEd)? What if it doesn't work reliably? This part of the RfC is premature, IMO. Kaldari (talk) 07:03, 29 September 2012 (UTC)

Discussion of default functionality

 * This isn't going to work. Javascript syntax highlighters never entirely work, and certainly not without side effects, regardless of how brilliant the implementation. As there is no implementation as yet, this vote is at best moot and at worst paving the way for enabling broken functionality, since there is no telling what side effects this will have. -— Isarra ༆ 16:00, 21 September 2012 (UTC)


 * I agree with Isarra. We can get consensus to ask developers to implement this tool without having to decide right now, without seeing the actual implementation, whether to turn it on by default for everyone. If / when the functionality is developed, that can be handled rather simply via another proposal at VPR. No need to rush to a decision on that right now. wctaiwan (talk) 08:30, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Differentiating other kinds of syntax
There are other forms of syntax that are fairly pervasive on Wikipedia articles, particularly Wikilinks, infoboxes, headers, and many others. While this question is not intended to immediately extend the proposed function, it opens the idea that this function, with future consensus, could be expanded to fit other kinds of common syntax. Participants who support this idea are free to specify which kinds of syntax might be useful to differentiate under the Discussion header.

Support: we should consider differentiating other kinds of syntax

 * Weak/Conditional Support the key word being "consider". I'm all for a more clear editing interface, and there are a few ways that further differentiation would help. But it really is a case by case basis. Really we should be striving for WYSIWYG because that would maximize the clarity of the syntax in most cases. Shooterwalker (talk) 01:02, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. For the same reasons as I support the other proposals, above. A study should be undertaken to see how to optimise this. It's a highly technical matter; but it should not be left in the hands of the tech-head high-priestly caste, as far too many decisions are for the Wikipedian infrastructure. Editors who frequent WT:MOS, for example, include professionals who are not necessarily coding gurus but who are expert in the design and management of such interfaces. N oetica Tea? 03:41, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * This is worth investigating, even if nothing comes out of it. Syntax highlighting benefits all editors, including those who don't want to put up with the VisualEditor. MER-C 04:35, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Strongly support: the more syntax is highlighted, the easier editing is. — Dmitrij D. Czarkoff (talk•track) 12:31, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support/Comment I use a text editor called Programmer's Notepad in place of the default notepad. This program has various modules for various languages, but one of the amazing features is the pairing of brackets/parenthesis. Each opening bracket is paired with the respective closing bracket as one colour. This would be profoundly useful for editing templates. -  Floydian  τ ¢  15:45, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Strongly support: as I said above, WikEd syntax highlighting is a blessing for new users, and the more we can get that functionality available as a default, the better. It's sad to see a user build up enthusiasm for contributing to Wikipedia, click "edit" on an ordinary article, then be confronted with Infobox syntax and have to scroll through it before they see something they can parse as text. More than just "consider", please. MartinPoulter (talk) 18:01, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support as nominator, with reasoning above. I should also note that I've found this to be highly useful using the text highlighting program I discussed at the top of this proposal.  I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 04:57, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Because this puts us on the slippery slope to the text editor becoming a vim emulation, and that's a good thing.... ;-) Garamond Lethe  06:19, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * You mean Emacs not vim. Why use vi?. :) Bgwhite (talk) 07:32, 24 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Support as long as it's customizable: should be able to opt out of individual components (such as info boxes); should be able to customize colors. We're not likely to find colors that please everyone, and there are accessibility issues with color blindness etc. — kwami (talk) 07:05, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support Bring Wikipedia editing into the late 1980's when other code editors started to use them. Should be able to be turned off.  Some people have problems viewing text with multiple colors. Bgwhite (talk) 07:32, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support This would be good. Gigs (talk) 13:57, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support, but with the option to turn it off if not wanted. —Bruce1eetalk 06:42, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support per Bruce1ee. &bull; Jesse V.(talk) 22:17, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - Highlighting would be good for wikilinks, external (URL) links, and templates.  Also possible are bold and italic ... although that may be getting into WYSIWIG editing, which is probably another topic. --Noleander (talk) 13:12, 4 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support considering this; with a few reservations on such things as choice of colours for the user, not doing too much, etc. I'd quite like the idea of users being able to choose which syntax they personally would like differentiated.  Checkboxes to include/exclude whatever from the highlighting would make this a really user-designed option.  <span style="color:#003300; font-family: Apple Chancery, Zapf Chancery, cursive;">Pesky  (<span style="color:#003300; font-family:Papyrus, Noteworthy;">talk ) 03:39, 6 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Weak support – It's at least something to consider – maybe an option to turn on (off by default). Even better, you could choose what kinds on highlighting you want. –– Anonymouse321 (talk • contribs) 20:10, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Support - Don't see why not. Rlendog (talk) 15:32, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

Support other syntax differentiation, but in a different gadget

 * Support. I support this as a separate gadget in preferences, as long as it not on by default. --Timeshifter (talk) 05:40, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. Per timeshifter above and stephan schulz below. —Quiddity (talk) 03:20, 27 September 2012 (UTC)

Oppose: we should restrict text differentiation to references only

 * I just tried Remember the Dot's syntax highlighter, and I find it to be quite overwhelming, especially when editing a large article. If we try to give everything fancy colors in the edit window, it will become hard to see the references—the main part to be highlighted. David  1217  What I've done 23:55, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Oppose. To much highlighting is distracting. I would support a configurable highlighter where editors can select which kind of elements they do want highlighted (but with a very restricted default setting). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:54, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Oppose – Maybe. The idea sounds good, especially as an OPTION. Let's get one improvement up and running first, tho. GenQuest (talk) 15:02, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

Discussion of differentiating other kinds of syntax
It would be nice to be able to either switch each component independantly, or choose our own colours for each component, with a reasonable default that is sufficient to identify, but not so in your face as to be distracting. Acessability for visually impaired should be considered. Selectable colurs may be sufficient for this purpose. A toggle button that can be flipped while editing might be nice too. &bull; &bull; &bull; Peter (Southwood) (talk): 05:35, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Not hugely user friendly, but no matter what you'll be able to change it with a user css file while you are logged in. Gigs (talk) 16:41, 28 September 2012 (UTC)


 * The ultimate solution is to make each highlighting customizable, whether using a user interface or even plain CSS. Nageh (talk) 19:54, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

Implementation
Can we see the implementation before deciding if we want this on for everyone by default? People appear to have been voting purely on the intent of the thing, which is certainly fine when deciding whether or not to go into development, but it doesn't really get us any further than that since at this point we simply cannot know how it is going to work cross-platform or what side effects it may have, both generally and on more specific subsets of systems.

Mind, if this were something else, that wouldn't be such an issue, but scripts mucking with the text box tend to be buggy by their very nature, not in the least because every browser handles forms and javascript differently, and every OS handles input differently. This is why there are all these wonderful rich text workarounds on other sites that never entirely work as expected, and while this isn't anything that fancy, the inherent problems are the same. That Remember the dot and Cacycle had to come up with rather unexpected workarounds just so the highlighting in their scripts (that syntax highlighter and WikiEd) didn't break browsers' undo/redo is a perfect example of that. -— Isarra ༆ 08:08, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Your concerns are, of course, legitimate, but I doubt any implementation will be available at all without substantial support on this RfC. If this is something like this is requested at bugzilla, it is likely to fall on deaf ears unless there is strong consensus coming from a large number of editors because they say they are strapped for resources.  So until that happens, I'm afraid there won't be any specific implementation available to see or test.  The only other possibility is finding other individuals on Wikipedia who have the skills to begin making such a function, which I have been trying to do.  I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 08:16, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * That's fine, and a consensus that we want to go forward would be needed regardless; I guess what I'm afraid of is that somewhere down the line someone will take the current discussion on whether or not to turn the theoretical thing on by default and use it to get something tangible and buggy turned on for everyone. Because that sometimes happens. -— Isarra ༆ 08:57, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Could we get a comment from a developer as to how technically feasible the feature looks to them, especially when combined with existing features? -— Isarra ༆ 16:00, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm going to see if I can contact someone from bugzilla to comment here, though I find the interface hard to navigate and difficult to identify someone who might be willing to participate here. Until then, I think it's fair to say that something would not be implemented for all users if it caused major bugs.  I imagine it would need to go through alpha and beta testing.   I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 19:47, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I wish that were so, but considering what has happened with pending changes, it would seem that major bugs are not necessarily a blocker at all if there is accepted consensus for the concept. -— Isarra ༆ 20:47, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Nobody has posted an example here, so for the benefit of those who have never seen syntax highlighting, here is a simple piece of HTML as seen in  a web editor HTML source code example.svg. Even if the tags were coloured it  would be a huge step in  the right  direction. This RfC is looking for a consensus - it would be inappropriate here to  begin discussing the technical implementation  here,  but  I'll  hasten to  add that  this would be an implementation  for the benefit  of all Wikis. I  would guard against asking  Bugzilla for input at  this stage, let's get  a strong  consensus for it first. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:27, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Agreed. And for that matter, it seems overly conservative to me to oppose this on the basis of an implementation that doesn't actually exist yet.  I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 00:34, 24 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the example, Kudpung. Yes, it should make editing easier. Support. Yopienso (talk) 07:18, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

I'm glad to see syntax highlightening being discussed, as I find it makes working with references a lot easier. Some time ago I wrote together a simple gadget to do syntax highlightning on Norwegian Wikipedia, called AceWikiEditor, since it's using the Ace editor. It's quite rough, and has not been updated for some time, but can be tested using <pre style="overflow:scroll;"> mw.loader.load('//no.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Gadget-AceWikiEditor.js&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript&maxage=21600&smaxage=86400'); The idea was stolen from the CodeEditor project. The advantage of this approach is that Ace is well-tested and works across browsers, but on the other hand it does have issues with complex characters, which really makes it a no-go. It's also a unnecessary heavy package to load, so I really like the simplicity of Remember the dot's implementation, and it would be great if we could work towards a stable release enabled by default. One feature that could be borrowed from AceWikiEditor is a toolbar button to enable/disable syntax highlightening. – Danmichaelo (talk) 12:08, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I added that to my common.js page, and it's brilliant! It does have a downside: it changed the font and made it smaller, which is really annoying. Still, this looks really good. The color choices could be better, but already it makes editing much easier. :) &bull; Jesse V.(talk) 22:22, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Wow! Thanks for mentioning this; it is indeed really cool.  <span style="padding:3px;color:gray;font:400 0.9em 'Garamond', serif">Garamond <span style="padding:3px;color:gray;font:400 0.9em 'Garamond', serif">Lethe  23:11, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, thanks enormously for bringing this into  the discussion. I  haven't  tested it  yet, but it  proves that  it  can be done whichever software solution  is ultimately developed for it. How we ever lived without  it  for so many  years is an enigma. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:23, 29 September 2012 (UTC)


 * By the way, here is an example of an online service that uses syntax highlighting for HTML, javascript, and CSS. It works in IE, Firefox, Opera, and Chrome.  I'm sure it would work in virtually all others.  The service even has documentation.  Given this service exists and works flexibly across a number of different formats, it would seem very doable to make a similar program for wiki markup.  I, Jethrobot  drop me a line (note: not a bot!) 05:26, 5 October 2012 (UTC)


 * I have used AceWikiEditor for a few days and came away fairly impressed. An issue that definitely needs to be resolved is speed--it takes seconds to load, and if I start typing things before it finishes loading, it would reset the cursor position when it has finished loading, which is undesirable. It also seems to interfere with Firefox's Find feature, which makes it difficult to get to and replace specific text. Generally, it has done a lot to reduce my scepticism, but these are things that should be fixed in final the implementation. wctaiwan (talk) 05:36, 5 October 2012 (UTC)