Recently I've wanted to colour some piece of text on my Ikiwiki page.
It seems that Markdown can do it only using HTML tags, so I used
`<span class="color">foo bar baz</span>`.

However, in my opinion mixing Markdown syntax and HTML tags is rather ugly,
so maybe we should create a new color plugin to add more color to Ikiwiki ;)
I know that another Wikis have similar plugin, for example
[WikiDot](http://www.wikidot.com/).

I've noticed that htmlscrubber plugin strips `style` attribute, because of
security, so probably we need to use `class` attribute of HTML. But then
we have to customize our `local.css` file to add all color we want to use.
It's not as easy in usage like color name or definition as plugin argument,
but I don't have a better idea right now.

What do you think about it? --[[Paweł|ptecza]]

> Making a plugin preserve style attributes can be done, it just has to add
> them after the sanitize step, which strips them. The general method is
> adding placeholders first, and replacing them with the real html later.
> 
> The hard thing to me seems to be finding a syntax that is better than a
> `<span>`. A preprocessor directive is not really any less ugly than html
> tags, though at least it could play nicely with nested markdown: --[[Joey]]
> 
>	\[[!color red,green """
>	Xmas-colored markdown here
>	"""]]

>> I'm glad you like that idea. In my opinion your syntax looks good.
>> Out of curiosity, why did you used 2 colors in your example? What is HTML
>> result for it? ;)

>>> I was thinking one would be foreground, the other background. Don't
>>> know if setting the background makes sense or not.

>> I can try to create that plugin, if you are too busy now. I'm not Perl
>> hacker, but I wrote a lot of Perl scripts in my life and color plugin
>> doesn't seem to be very hard task. --[[Paweł|ptecza]]

>> Yes, it's a good intro plugin, have at it! --[[Joey]]

---

This is a RC1 of my `color` plugin. It works for me well, but all your
comments are very welcome. --[[Paweł|ptecza]]

	--- /dev/null	2008-07-24 09:38:19.000000000 +0200
	+++ color.pm	2008-07-25 14:43:15.000000000 +0200
	@@ -0,0 +1,75 @@
	+#!/usr/bin/perl
	+# Ikiwiki text colouring plugin
	+# Paweł Tęcza <ptecza@net.icm.edu.pl>
	+package IkiWiki::Plugin::color;
	+
	+use warnings;
	+use strict;
	+use IkiWiki 2.00;
	+
	+sub import { #{{{
	+	hook(type => "preprocess", id => "color", call => \&preprocess);
	+	hook(type => "sanitize",   id => "color", call => \&sanitize);
	+} #}}}
	+
	+sub preserve_style(@) { #{{{
	+	my ($colors, $text) = @_;
	+	$colors = '' unless $colors;	# foreground and background colors
	+	$text   = '' unless $text;	# text
	+	
	+	# Check colors
	+	my ($color1, $color2) = ();
	+	$colors = lc($colors);	# Regexps on lower case strings are simpler
	+	if ($colors =~ /,/) {
	+		# Probably defined both foreground and background color
	+		($color1, $color2) = ($colors =~ /(.*),(.*)/);
	+	}
	+	else {
	+		# Probably defined only foreground color
	+		($color1, $color2) = ($colors, '');
	+	}
	+	
	+	# Validate colors. Only color name or color code are valid.
	+	my ($fg, $bg) = ();
	+	$fg = $color1 if ($color1 &&
	+			 ($color1 =~ /^[a-z]+$/ || $color1 =~ /^#[0-9a-f]{3,6}$/));
	+	$bg = $color2 if ($color2 &&
	+			 ($color2 =~ /^[a-z]+$/ || $color2 =~ /^#[0-9a-f]{3,6}$/));
	+
	+	my $preserved = '';
	+	if ($fg || $bg) {
	+		$preserved .= 'COLORS {';
	+		$preserved .= 'color: '.$fg if ($fg);
	+		$preserved .= '; ' if ($fg && $bg);
	+		$preserved .= 'background-color: '.$bg if ($bg);
	+		$preserved .= '} SROLOC;TEXT {'.$text.'} TXET';
	+	}
	+	
	+	return $preserved;
	+
	+} #}}}
	+
	+sub replace_preserved_style(@) { #{{{
	+	my $content = shift;
	+
	+	if ($content) {
	+		$content =~ s/COLORS {/<span style="/;
	+		$content =~ s/} SROLOC;TEXT {/">/;
	+		$content =~ s/} TXET/<\/span>/;
	+	}
	+
	+	return $content; 
	+} #}}}
	+
	+sub preprocess (@) { #{{{
	+	return preserve_style($_[0], $_[2]);
	+} #}}}
	+
	+sub sanitize (@) { #{{{
	+	my %params = @_;
	+	
	+	return replace_preserved_style($params{content})
	+		if (exists $params{content})
	+} #}}}
	+
	+1
	--- /dev/null	2008-07-24 09:38:19.000000000 +0200
	+++ color.mdwn	2008-07-25 14:50:19.000000000 +0200
	@@ -0,0 +1,31 @@
	+\[[!template id=plugin name=color core=0 author="[[Paweł Tęcza|ptecza]]"]]
	+
	+This plugin can be used to color a piece of text on Ikiwiki page.
	+It's possible setting foreground and/or background color of the text.
	+
	+The plugin syntax is very simple. You only need to type name (e.g. `white`)
	+or HTML code of colors (e.g. `#ffffff`) and a text you want to color.
	+The colors should by separated using a comma character.
	+
	+Below are a few examples:
	+
	+    \[[!color white,#ff0000 "White text on red background"]]
	+
	+Foreground color is defined as a word, background color is defined as HTML
	+color code.
	+
	+    \[[!color white "White text on default color background"]]
	+
	+Foreground color is default color if only one color was typed and a comma
	+character is missing.
	+
	+    \[[!color white, "White text on default color background"]]
	+
	+Background color is missing, so the text is displayed on default background.
	+
	+    \[[!color ,#ff0000 "Default color text on red background"]]
	+
	+Foreground is missing, so the text has default color.
	+
	+This plugin is not enabled by default. You can do that in [[ikiwiki.setup]]
	+file (hint: `add_plugins` variable).