So what is hypervariety.com?

I invented/discovered a method of specification, for web pages and their behavior. It's called the templates system, which works as a mostly interpreted layer over HTML5. It's become obvious that it works well, and I've decided to specify and implement a pure project to support it.

This web page aims to become the most formal place where it can be documented -- simultaneously acting as a proof of concept. The hoped-for result is a readability that can be understood by a beginner. However, as the programmer, all my decisions should favor function over form.

Rules for this server:

There is a global permanent redirect from anywhere/$/ to /$/, so that directory is always locallyTo me, not you. available.

There is an app which edits files (at files). Storage is local, but publishing to an account is supported. The priority is serving my own pages from /~hypervariety/files.

HTML just needs a header (a light prelude that includes $/Events.js) to support the basic functions. There are a minimal number of files on the server that have the header in their own source — the vast majority of files served from the site have it auto-added before being served to the browser.

The most formal and restrictive version of my method is to use a declared subset of HTML5, chosen to be manageable within a <div contentEditable>. Ordinary HTML encoding applies when <B>, <I>, and <U> are available, along with <P> or <BR> for line breaks, and other ordinary useful word-processing style features like <OL>. We get all this for free by being in a modern browser since it doesn't even need a header.

From there, I confect a tag completely from scratch: <templates>. When read, its contents define one or more templates. A template can be seen as an impromptu description of the structure of the page, or as a blank and boring version of what that part of the page is. The relevant styles and scripts are non-destructively copied, from the chosen testbed for development, into any other file that wants to use it. As the source of structure, they encourage easier automation.

I find it a fun task to implement a browser feature by wrapping it into a template. There are a number of carefully-written standalone templates, for use on this server, to implement HTML5 magic. For beginners, templates are the link to that magic, along with a creative space that supports writing, math, and art.