I was wondering if there was any possibility of Mermaid diagram support/handling being added to Tinderbox’s markdown support, for easy generation of inline or separate diagrams?
Basic Information about Mermaid (Mermaid-js.github.io)
CLI Mermaid->{SVG,PDF,PNG} Processor
If you look at that first link under “Misc->Use Cases/Integrations” you’ll see the rather long list of existing integrations and uses. Mermaid support is already common in many other markdown systems.
It looks to me like you could do this yourself, in terms of writing in the text pane and then viewing the diagram in the Preview pane. Here’s an example:
And here’s a sample file:
xmermaid.tbx (127.5 KB)
If you have a good use case for this, I think it might be fun to develop a demo.
Use case for Mermaid? Lots.
I really appreciated the example, and see how it was done there, but that kind of misses the point in that it requires a live connection to a mermaid server. In Joplin, Obsidian, and other notes apps I’ve used they support mermaid as as internal engine, so I never have to worry if net is up, links have changed, etc. to access it
Personally, as notes, I’d use the sequence diagrams to record/diagram interactions, and the flowchart to try and sketch out processes, evaluation patterns, and so forth. As it is, I kind of have to do them separate and then integrate them as images or svg’s. I’ll often abuse other charts available to sketch out taxonomy and naming breakdowns, just to give another example.
That’s trivial to overcome. Instead of using the link, download the mermaid source to a code note and ^include the note.
Unless you fly a lot, though, or do lots of fieldwork in remote places or battle zones, having a live connection (or a cached copy!) of the script really shouldn’t be much of an obstacle — especially considering I got this together for you within hours of your initial request.
This looks really good, btw, thanks!
Just to clarify, is the preview template sufficient, or are the notes within Hints needed too?
The other notes in Hints aren’t used in this demo, but they do no harm.
Think of /Hints as behind-the-curtain materila like the containers /Prototypes and /Templates. It’s not really your content yet still need (at times) to access notes there and so it has to go somewhere (visible) in your TBX. As with prototypes or templates you don’t currently use but are present in your document, the additional notes in /Hints will do you no harm as @eastgate has already noted.
Further to the discussion of Mermaid Markdown and Tinderbox, we expect to roll out a pertinent new feature for Tinderbox in the Backstage program shortly. I think it’s pretty exciting.
I believe the Mermaid main site is now here:
Ya, mee too. I’ve already created a starter file with all the mermaid templates. Working on demos now.
