Context:
We use Nextcloud (Text/Collectives) extensively for documenting our institutional processes, guides, and internal documentation in Markdown. The collaborative aspect works well for our teams.
Current limitation:
A major barrier to broader adoption is the absence of inline/contextual comments in Markdown documents - similar to the review/annotation features users know from Word/ODT documents.
This limitation makes it difficult to transition teams to Markdown, as they are accustomed to annotating, commenting, reviewing, and validating specific passages within documents.
We’ve observed that LaSuite (developed by the French government’s DINUM) implements this functionality using BlockNote.js as their editor, and will include inline commenting capabilities (visible at 7:54 in their demo).
Requested functionality:
Implementation of contextual annotations in Markdown documents with an appropriate UI:
- Ability to add comments attached to specific lines or blocks
- Comment listing and management
- Comment validation/resolution workflow
- Comment archiving
Benefits:
This enhancement would combine the advantages of Markdown (portability, lightweight, simplicity, long-term preservation) with traditional review/annotation workflows, facilitating adoption by non-technical teams.
This could become a consideration factor for institutions evaluating different collaborative platforms.
Thank you for considering this request.
Environment:
- Nextcloud version: 31.0.11
- Text app version: 5.0.2
- Collectives app version: 3.4.0
Hello there @coolidfrez,
you started a topic in development category. This category is intended for active developers of the core or apps in the Nextcloud ecosystem.
From the description in your topic, it is not clear if you are seeking help and advice about a concrete problem you have or you want to actually develop the corresponding solution.
Please specify explicitly the required information to help you best. These are:
- What you want to achieve
- What you have done so far
- What is failing
- What you expect from the forum community
Without additional information the community members cannot help you in an efficient manner. Please keep in mind that the help here in the forum are mostly based on work of volunteers and thus it is just fair to reduce the burden on them.
If you accidentally posted in the category, just give a hint and a moderator can move the corresponding category.
My (personal) interpretation is that you wanted to formulate a feature request. This is much better suited on the issue tracker of GitHub. For example, the issue tracker of collectives might be a good starting point. The devs there might redirect you to a common library (I could assume so). Here in the forums, the devs will not look for issues.
If this is the case, please open an issue on GitHub and post the link here for reference. Thanks a lot!
Regards,
christianlupus
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Hello @christianlupus,
Thank you for the clarification - you’re right. This is indeed a feature request, not a development question!
I’ll open an issue on the Collectives or Text GitHub tracker as you suggested, since this relates to collaborative document editing.
I’ll post the GitHub link here for reference once created.
Thanks you!
Regards
1 Like