waylan/Python-Markdown — Issue #55: An option to embed footnotes earlier than on the end of document
Author: Mekk
Created: 2011-11-21 23:38:23+00:00
State: open

It would be great, if footnote extension allowed one to decide where should the footnotes text be placed, allowing (depending on some config param) one to:

- put all footnote definitions on the end of the document (default, the way things work currently)

- put footnote definitions on the end of the section footnotes are used (= show all referred footnotes before the next section starts) { extra option - set section level }

- put footnote definitions after the current paragraph (= show all refererred footnotes once current paragraph/table/block/whatever is finished)

- expand them inline where referred, just wrap with some CSS-identifiable span

Rationale:

a) (my main use-case) On ebook-reader (while viewing EPUB file) navigating to the footnote, and back, tend to be slow and (on non-touch readers) sometimes require troublesome navigation. Having footnote rendered below the current paragraph (likely styled with smaller font) would make much nicer user experience.

b) Also on webpages it may make better presentation if footnotes are close to the text they refer to (here some javascript instrumentation may make it possible to dynamically show them on mouseover or mouseclick)