S5 Status

[tonydewan]

I saw this list of outstanding issues to discuss in a recent post in
this group:

- What should S5 markup look like today? Should it make use of
HTML5? Microformats? RDFa?
- Can we get S5 markup producers to agree on a standard for markup?
- Can we establish a test suite to validate S5 markup?
- Could we maintain a central registry of S5 themes around S5 markup?
- What should the standard S5 JavaScript look like today? Should it
make use of something like jQuery or Prototype?
- Could it include hooks for extensible functionality, e.g. table of
contents? Could we maintain a central registry of plugins?

I'd love to to start to tackle some of these things. I'm not sure if
anyone is really "in charge" of the project, but I have a rather
immediate need for an updated S5 implementation, and will probably
create a public github fork to manage my changes. Unless of course the
person "in charge" has a more preferred method...

In the interest of keeping the conversation going, here my thoughts on
the above question.

- What should S5 markup look like today? Should it make use of
HTML5? Microformats? RDFa?
I don't see a whole lot of the current proposed S5 structure that
would benefit from HTML5. However, slide content certainly could (and
should!). I also generally have an aversion to the required XHTML
doctype and its implications. I understand it's for compatibility with
the Opera project, but I'm not sure I care about that...

- Can we get S5 markup producers to agree on a standard for markup?
I think this is a nonissue. As i mentioned above, very little would
have to change in the current S5 structure to make it "HTML5". Plus,
with a project as seemingly inactive as this one, I think dictating a
structure is fine, as long as whoever dictates it is open to feedback.

- Can we establish a test suite to validate S5 markup?
Sure, though I think it's less important of an issue, but well within
the realm of possibility.

- Could we maintain a central registry of S5 themes around S5 markup?
Absolutely should, yes. I also think it would be great to have a
presentation tool that you could pass a URL to a presentation and it
just works. Perhaps you can choose from a list of themes or apply
you're own (again via URL) and provide a solid presentation mode.

- What should the standard S5 JavaScript look like today? Should it
make use of something like jQuery or Prototype?
From what I've seen, the codebase needs quite a bit of optimization
and modernization. I think basing on jQuery makes the most sense. That
would (will?) be my choice.

- Could it include hooks for extensible functionality, e.g. table of
contents? Could we maintain a central registry of plugins?
An interesting concept. I'm not sure how important that is, though.
We're not talking about a project with much complexity that would gain
much from having a plugin architecture. But I could be wrong.

Some other thoughts:
I would love to incorporate some of the more exciting things going on
right now. For example, transitions and transformations would be a
great addition to themes. I can think of half a dozen UI concepts that
would really improve the experience of using and sharing an S5
presentation.