Birch 1.7.0 Dev Release

  • Added commands for more HTML formatting elements:
    • abbreviation
    • bold
    • citation
    • code
    • definition
    • emphasis
    • italic
    • keyboard-input
    • inline-quote
    • strikethrough
    • sample-output
    • small
    • strong
    • subscript
    • superscript
    • underline
    • variable
  • Changed onDidChange callback to take array of Mutations.
  • Fixed bug where could get stuck extending selection state.
  • Fixed bug where scrollbar wouldn’t theme properly on startup.
  • Fixed editing problems in filtered view where items would display out of order.
  • Fixed case where cursor could end up in wrong position when moving line up/down.
  • Fixed bug where deleting consecutive characters wouldn’t coalesce into a single undo operation.

Install Birch

I’m toying around with the current version, but I don’t really understand how to use ‘abbreviation’. I see the abbr tag when opening the file in textmate and I understand that it is an HTML tag. but beyond that I don’t grasp how to use this command.

In the case of abbreviation I’m not sure that there is a strong use case at the moment.

The general idea is that Birch should allow you to markup your content using HTML 5 inline content tags. Some tags are really useful… bold, italic, etc. So are less well known (keyboard-input), but can be useful when writing certain kids of documents, such as the Birch user guide. And some are included mostly for completeness with the HTML 5 spec, such as the abbreviation tag.

I think to make abbreviation tag more useful I need to add some more API so that you can edit it’s title attribute. In which case then when you mouse over it you’ll see the full title… but that usecase and the need for it in Birch are a ways off.