[childintime]

Turns out text files are a binary format also, with any number of encodings, ever more binary as UTF8 grows, requiring constant updates, hidden by the OS. Text files are just the name for a renderer built in into every OS.

So what exactly distinguishes them? The OS knows how to render them? It's just a linear list of characters? The reliance on a fixed font to allow some form of layout or positioning? Good basis for embedded DSL's, like Markdown?

Don't forget they are a binary format also. Oh, I just said that. I anticipate the day UTF8 will be a fond memory of a big mistake we made in our youth, that held us back for decades.

Don't forget that all of IT is a shit show sprinkled over with dollar paint, much like alchemy was. We don't yet know what the formation in Information is.

[andsoitis]

> the day UTF8 will be a fond memory of a big mistake we made

Alternative that would be better?

[childintime]

I think that would require a complete rethink of the stack, silver bullet style. AFAIK no one has done so, few have the motivation. Maybe AI can help make it feasible for someone (or a small team) to do it in the not too distant future.

[andsoitis]

But what is the “big mistake”, as you put it?

[wodenokoto]

I actually agree, and kinda wished there was some sort of "binary" alternative to json that every text editor would open and let me edit as easily as json, because at the end of the day, it is no more binary than utf8 encodings with their number of bits, endians and confused line endings.