Gentlefolk, I have been thinking on Markdown's lack of "proper" table support for a long while now. Here's where I have arrived...
## I Don't Like HTML Tables It is often argued that embedded HTML is the way to markdown rich tables. Unfortunately, this contradicts the higher markdown ideal that a raw markdown document (including tables!) should be good 1. Firstly for readers, 2. Secondly for authors, 3. Lastly for parsers which don't even rate a mention because markdown is for Humans. You have probably noticed already that HTML tables are *appalling* for readers and a nightmare for authors. They are hardly "good" for markdown parsers either, which (not being HTML parsers) treat HTML tables as impenetrable blobs to be output "as is". Where does that leave us when we want to go from markdown to PDF? ## I Do Like Monospaced Tables It is the _visual alignment_ of terms into rows and columns that enables a reader to recognise a table. Without any recognisable alignment, a reader sees a jumbled "cloud" of terms -- which is exactly how we see tables with a variable width font. Additionally, a raw markdown document should 1. Be sharable, and, 2. Convey the same information to every reader. A raw markdown document must therefore be rendered *equivalently* for every reader. This can only be assumed if every reader has the same text spacing, and a mono spaced is _a_ reasonable way of achieving this. With all that in mind, I offer up my "Teardown" table specification for your consideration (I realise it will be "torn down", but nothing ventured nothing gained). Teardown offers the following over and above MultiMarkDown's table support: * Multi-line cell content, * Additional "Arty" syntax for titles and footers (much nicer for authors and readers), * Colspan (without meta-chars in cell content), * Rowspan, * Cell alignment (without meta-characters in content) *Please note* that I have _not_ implemented this specification. This is all just hot air produced by an author trying contribute something toward better table support for markdown. (specification to follow...)
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