Re: [Docutils-users] Changing the default role for all documents

[David G. <go...@py...>]

On Tue, Dec 23, 2008 at 15:38, Christian Siefkes <chr...@si...> wrote:
> I would like to change the `default role` to ``literal`` in all my reST
> documents. In a single document, I can write
>
>  .. default-role:: literal
>
> But I didn't find a way to automatically specify such a setting for all
> documents I process. I guess it must be configurable in some way, but
> http://docutils.sourceforge.net/docs/user/config.html doesn't mention
> anything. Can anybody help me out?

There is no way to change the default role globally via configuration files.

Why do you want to make such a change?

I recommend that you do not change the default role to "literal", for
a couple of reasons. 1. ``literal`` is the standard; your text will
become non-standard and non-portable. 2. ``text`` is not significantly
more difficult to type than `text`. 2. ``...`` has different behavior
than :literal:`...` (e.g. :literal:`a\ b \c` vs. ``a\ b \c``, etc.).

If you insist on doing it, you could make a custom front-end tool.
Copy an existing tool, and add code like this:

import docutils.parsers.rst.roles
docutils.parsers.rst.roles.DEFAULT_INTERPRETED_ROLE = 'literal'

That ought to work (note: untested).

Another possibility is to add config functionality. Patches are welcome.

-- 
David Goodger <http://python.net/~goodger>