Notes on a talk

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Questions and answers

Q: and A: at the start of a line make an exchange, set apart from the notes around it: the question in italics, the answer upright. A name in parentheses shows beside the label. Another A: straight after an answer – unnamed, or naming the same person – continues it as a new paragraph, and the same goes for Q::

Q (audience): Is this a pendulum swing or an integration?
A (Thomas): An integration.

A: The renaissance and the scientific revolution each had half of it.
A (Sarah): I'd say it's a spiral.

That is one answer from Thomas in two paragraphs, then one from Sarah. Any line starting at the margin that isn’t Q: or A: ends the exchange.

A backslash (\A:) keeps a line that happens to start that way as typed.

Retro cards and votes

A retro’s cards work the same way: Good:, Bad: and Try: each start a card, labelled G, B or T in blue-green, red-orange or blue, colours that stay apart for most colour blindness too, with A: after it as its discussion. Every card line is a card of its own, even from the same person twice in a row. +1 under a card or a question is a vote for it, named or not, with a comment after a colon or not; the card shows how many votes it has:

Bad (Josh): We were surprised by the release deadline
+1 (Rob)
+1 (Joe): same, I found out the day of
A (Rob): Would like to see those planned relative to the calendar.

Try [x] (Ana): Put the release dates on the team calendar

A +1 with no card or question above it stays as typed.

Clicking a card’s G or B marks its discussion done: the line gets an [x] (Good [x] (Josh):), and the card, its votes and its answers fade. Click again to take it away. A Try’s T is a box instead, ticked once it’s been tried: the same [x], a check in place of the T, and the card stays as it was. On a slide being presented, a card shows whether it’s done but can’t be clicked.

Definitions

A line starting ! is a definition: a term, a colon, and what it means, set as a dictionary sets it: in a box, the term in bold small capitals on a tint. The meaning is markdown like any other line (links, bold, [red]{red}), and who used the term can follow it in parentheses, as in an exchange:

!SLAB (Venkat): similar layers of abstraction
!gatherer: an intermediate operation that can see the whole stream
!gatherer: one that keeps its own *state* between elements
!REPL:

Venkat keeps coming back to !SLAB.

Definitions on lines in a row make one glossary, and the same term again straight after is another sense of it, numbered. A term with nothing after its colon is one you heard but haven’t looked up: it reads not yet defined, and clicking it fills it in as a field is. A term in capitals whose meaning spells it out has those letters bolded: similar layers of abstraction.

Written with a ! before it anywhere else in the document – before its definition or after, in an aside, on a later slide of a deck – the term is set as it is in its entry, and its meaning shows on hover.

A term in capitals is matched as written, or with an s (!SLOs); one in lower case, in any case and plural or singular (!Sealed interfaces at the start of a sentence). A ! before a word that isn’t defined is left as typed, as are code and links.

A backslash (\!SLAB:, \!SLAB) keeps a line or a word that happens to start that way as typed.

Quotes

A blockquote whose last line starts with -- takes that line as its attribution, set right-aligned under the quote. Links, and scripture:, work there as anywhere:

> The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.
> -- [William Blake](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Marriage_of_Heaven_and_Hell)