[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #5161: balance_tags option should not be in the user interface

[WordPress Trac]

#5161: balance_tags option should not be in the user interface
----------------------------+-----------------------------------------------
 Reporter:  JeremyVisser    |       Owner:  anonymous  
     Type:  defect          |      Status:  new        
 Priority:  normal          |   Milestone:  2.5        
Component:  Administration  |     Version:  2.3        
 Severity:  minor           |    Keywords:  2nd-opinion
----------------------------+-----------------------------------------------
 In the WP Admin → Options → Writing ({{{options-writing.php}}}), there is
 an option "!WordPress should correct invalidly nested XHTML automatically"
 which controls whether {{{balance_tags()}}} is run on post content or not.

 I'm fully supportive of this feature — I think it's important to ensure
 the HTML that is output to browsers is valid. There have been a few
 situations where users needed to turn this off, e.g. bugs in the function,
 or a plugin misbehaves with it on (if I remember correctly, runPHP).

 However, this is a KDE-style option where it is put there for a niche
 case. In 99% of cases, you will want it on.

 A few people on the mailing lists have stated a number of times that we
 should take a GNOME-like approach to these sort of features, and let them
 be controlled only by plugins. This option is left over from the dark ages
 of !WordPress, and I don't think the cases for turning it off are big
 enough to warrant its inclusion in the user interface.

 If a plugin has a problem with balancing tags (e.g. runPHP), the offending
 plugin can simply remove the filter.

 {{{
 remove_filter('content_save_pre', 'balance_tags);
 }}}

 (...or whatever the code would be.)

 The new canonical redirect feature has far more many problems, and far
 more justification for it to be turned off, yet I don't see a checkbox
 "Redirect links to their canonical URL" anywhere in the user interface. If
 anything should have a checkbox, it's the canonical redirect feature —
 but, it doesn't have any such thing. So, we should remove this checkbox as
 well.

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Ticket URL: <http://trac.wordpress.org/ticket/5161>
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