Issue: The Automatic elimination of spaces in topic names is problematic

Topics that are generated from [[]] links with spaces (e.g. [[How To]]), cause problems down the line. E.g., when you rename such a topic, the topic name is grep'd for to find references to it, but that may not match the link that caused the topic to be created in the first place, e.g. "[[How To]]". Maybe I'm being a terribly naughty user, but it would be good if some holes were plugged around topic names and links that aren't pure and simple camelback. One way to deal with this type of problem would be to not be so smart about converting [[a b c]] to "abc" automatically, or converting it to topic "abc", but also fixing the original link, when it is saved, to read [[abc][a b c]] automatically. I would favor the second approach (which would need to be used whenever any conversion whatsoever is done to the link to become a topic name).

-- FredMannby - 19 Jun 2002

I would like to second the motion to plug some holes "around topic names and links that aren't pure and simple camelback". At first glance, the proposal to fix "the original link, when it is saved, to read [[abc][a b c]] automatically" sound like a step in the right direction.

I think I'm looking for the same thing that FredMannby is looking for -- so that renames of pages named as other than a WikiWord work properly in all respects.

-- RandyKramer - 19 Jun 2002

I am personally of the opinion that this spaced syntax is a bad thing. I removed the documentation for it on my sites. I propose that it serves no useful purpose and should be removed.

Whilst do I wholeheartedly agree with the idea that it should be written properly in the topic, I think converting it on save is a hack, especially given that there is no clean way to implement it.

The proposed solution would leave me thinking "I did not write it that way" and would make TWiki seem unpredictable.

-- MartinCleaver - 20 Jun 2002

After all, the spaced topic name rule was not such a great idea because it does create some side-effects. On the other side, we need to make sure that we filter out illegal characters for topic name links, so that users cannot create topics that have spaces in the name.

I propose to keep the feature for compatibility, but remove the documentation for spaces in topic names.

I changed the classification from BugReport to FeatureEnhancementRequest since this is not a bug, it was designed that way.

-- PeterThoeny - 20 Jun 2002

Like WikiWordsWithSpacesBreakPredictability this discussion died out without any result. It is even so ignored that the TopicSaveErrorWithTopicsContainingSpace went long unnoticed. In my experience it scares new users from TWiki. They use to occassionally try to create topic name with space and they get nasty error message. They're able to correct it, but it's obstructive.

I wanted to create simple To-Do list that could be used with people that would never use TWiki otherwise. Now they scream that it does not work or it's too complicated because they have to think out WikiWords and if they don't they get an bold error. Even if I manage to create topic with spaces in its name, it won't show in formatted search.... Is there anything I could do with it except hacking TWiki?

I agree that CamelCase should be the preferred form. But if novice user steps outside there are all kinds of misbehavior on TWiki's side... it would be really better to let it go and rename topic later. I vote for tildes for separating words and the dot on the beginning of SingletonWikiWords.

-- JurajVariny - 19 May 2004

Imagine what we would gain with regular search engines as Google when WikiWords are rendered with spaces. Who would ever think of looking for me with ArthurClemens? I get at least 2000 hits! (well, quite some doubles).

The same goes for interesting topics that get lost in wikiness.

-- ArthurClemens - 19 May 2004

Renaming topics and attachments is also a killer for WebDAV. It makes it impossible to drag and drop onto a web folder.

-- CrawfordCurrie - 19 May 2004

Developers of MoinWiki took an interesting approach to the problem of having spaced topics, especially with the GaGaParser topics that are created with spaces such as "foo bar" are allowed however the name of the textfile itself is converted to something like "foo%20bar" which is then converted back when the topic is called. this avoids some of the problems you are discussing while at the same time allows for interesting things some of which have also been talked about above. at any rate it may well be something to consider.

-- TravisBarker - 20 May 2004

I propose to automatically change the spaces to tildes/underscores/whatever and open the normal Edit page with message on top:

Warning: Spaces are not allowed in WikiNames. The topic was renamed to Topic~name~with~spaces .

Someone will certainly rename the topic later to make autolinking easier.

-- JurajVariny - 21 May 2004

doing the conversion automatically would be great if it converted both ways, but just converting it one way such as proposed above seems like a hack to me I don't like depending upon the idea that "Someone will certainly rename the topic later" it just creates more work for the admin of the site (who in reality is the person who will get stuck with the job or renaming topics all the time)

-- TravisBarker - 21 May 2004

In theory, TWiki should support spaces in topic names. These are not automatically linked, but can be made a link by putting [[]] around the words. However at least the save script has a problem with this, as mentioned in TopicSaveErrorWithTopicsContainingSpace. Solution is to convert the spaces to underscores, as is done with Wikipedia. So On_feeling_and_form becomes a link just as [[On feeling and form]]. So no topic renaming is necessary when TWiki supports underscores. This can be made as addition to the current CamelCase handling for wiki diehards.

Indeed this has been mentioned before, but somehow the technical realisation is either too difficult or not considered important enough. Perhaps an extra warning is necessary: when wiki engines are compared, such as in http://www.heise.de/kiosk/archiv/ct/03/25/202/ (also mentioned on CoffeeBreak), TWiki's lack of support for free linking is definitely a put-off. Let alone for managers. And I have seen this on discussion boards too.

Continued in TopicSaveErrorWithTopicsContainingSpace.

-- ArthurClemens - 21 May 2004

I still say ThomasWaldmann of moin wiki did the best job with the creation of his GaGaParser. single words, phrase matching and CamelCase all in the same basket, unfortunately the GaGaParser has not been maintained/patched to work with the latest versions of moin else I would already have a very nice example to show you. hopefully in the next week or two, I will find ways arround those issues.

-- TravisBarker - 21 May 2004

In the front of almighty TWiki code I've somewhat changed my opinion. See my patch in TopicSaveErrorWithTopicsContainingSpace. It keeps spaces everywhere. This is workable for years to come until there will be better behavior specified, implemented and tested.

-- JurajVariny - 24 May 2004