Just pointing out an implication: This moves the edits back to on-save. If the the work is done on-display, the board will be reading the post while the poster's think time is ticking by.

Personally, I don't think any post is so time-sensitively-urgent that the user can't spend a few moments to fix formatting errors before the tome is posted. But I'm willing to be convinced otherwise.

Watch-and-posts, and quoteathons are the most common times I can think of where posts slap through quickest, but generally? No URLs.

It is indeed hard to come up with a situation whereupon one needs to post bad HTML in a hurry.

Help! Help! I'm dying! What's the Heimlich maneuver again?

[a case in point. Tongue in cheek. I'm fine, really.]

If the user gets to see the modded HTML before it's saved, I have no real problem. Coming back on edit and finding something different from what you put in is what I think is wrong.

Eh. I have mixed feelings on the issue. What if I can't figure out what I've done wrong? Will it never post, causing me to be frustrated and discard my thought? I guess as long as I can accept some kind of "we tried to tidy and this is what we got" I suppose it's not that bad.

On the other side of it, I agree with ita that I'm generally unhappy to come back on edit and find my post not what I posted. Hell, I get grumpy at web editors for sticking their damn name in my damn page, even when I knew up front that would be happening.

Anyway. Mixed feelings. But on the whole, it's a good thing. It's good to be (lowercase) tidy.

What if I can't figure out what I've done wrong? Will it never post, causing me to be frustrated and discard my thought?

Not at all. With my suggestion, Tidy and Gus' enhancements will suggest a correction and display what the auto-corrected text will look like. It's up to you to accept the changes and hit post, or try to fix it yourself. The only alternatives I've seen are a) have Tidy, etc. fix the post and post it without any intermediate input from the poster, or b) do nothing and have the malformed html post as is (the current state).

The tidy alternatives proposed are -- have it fix it in the database or have it saved as entered, and fix it every time it's displayed (with a note visible only to the post owner).

When clarified like that, I lean towards on display. Then I can correct it myself, right?

I'm one of those people who never uses a preview option, even when offered. I make my mistakes for the whole internet to see, 'cause I'm too damned impatient to wait for a whole 'nother click-through screen. My dial-up is sometimes painfully slow. Of course, I don't want my mistakes to broke nothin', so it's all good.

I think I'd rather have the post fixed at the database rather than having to fix it every time it's displayed. That seems wasteful of resources.