Sometimes we've had posters need to ask what they did that caused the problem, and if they were stuck inside a no-post loop, they might not be able to ask.

They accept the Tidy'ed version and then they ask.

Unless something goes blewwy, can't we know that the quickedit expansion is going to be kosher?

Here's an example of a post with bad HTML we've run into a couple of times recently:

<font size="-3">
>blah blah blah</font>

Because the opening font tag is outside the quikedit and the closing font tag is inside the quikedit, on some browsers, the small font continues to the next post.

The same TidyPlus operations can be performed on both ends.

Flow:

TidyPlus is run on a new post. If we get an error, the preview page is presented (else, save), displaying how the TidyPlus will alter the display of their typing. In the edit box, we display what the poster typed. They may alter or accept. If they accept, the save (of what they typed) goes forward even if errors are still present. If they alter, we go back to the top of the stack.

On display, we run TidyPlus, which protects the board, if not the sense of the post.

But how does TidyPlus detect post-expansion errors, yet present a pre-expansion post for the poster to correct?

First quickedits, then TidyPlus operations are performed. Let's call that 'expansion'. The preview page displays the results of expansion. The edit box displays the initial input.

The preview page displays the results of expansion.

How confusing, though, for someone who put in one bit of HTML clumsily and is now faced with seeing t li and t blockquote t tt t /p where they're not expecting it.

Oh, now I see the disconnect. I wasn't thinking of showing the html of the expansion, but rather the resulting display. The preview page will show them what the expanded post will look like. In the single edit box below this will be the text they typed.

Sorry -- I was still kind of on one of Jon's suggestions. It would still make debugging an error like the one he cited difficult, though. Hell, it took us long enough to work out what was wrong.

Especially since it may look just perfect on their monitor (Jess's error went unnoticed for years).

Tidy fixes the >> problem. It converts the extra > to the & -gt entity.

I am starting to think this all way over-engineered. Storing what they typed, and displaying the expansion is going to gather up 99% of the cases. The remaining 1% won't break the board. We can give the poster a private message in that 1% where the post doesn't look right.

Liese's point about hassle-screens is solid, too. In the vast majortiy of cases the poster will accept the changes, so it just becomes a "Nyah, nyah! Had to fix your post!" nuisance.

I didn't mean a >> problem, but rather this one:

<font size="-3">
>blah blah blah</font>

Tidy will catch it, but when you display the expansion, it'll look perfectly fine to most people, and even the HTML savvy mightn't get from the source that it's broken.

When you say "storing what they typed and displaying the expansion" do you mean a correction screen, or just correcting and displaying?

Tidy fixes your example, ita, to display this:

blah blah blah.

do you mean a correction screen, or just correcting and displaying?

I mean no preview or correction page, beyond the edit page that is in use now. The edit box will contain exactly what was typed.