HTML requires you to understand symbolic representations, where <> means something special. It is more verbose, but no more structurally complex, than Markdown. It does not require you to understand imperative dynamic logic. Getting the hang of symbolic representations is easy, and getting the hang of imperative programming is very hard and most people can't do it. That's why the dividing line is where it is. Making a static bulleted list isn't a 'capability' in HTML if you weren't thinking it was one in Markdown, and inventing your own precisely crafted definition with no purpose other than to include HTML then calling all others unreasonable doesn't convince anyone.
replyHow would one do an if condition or enumerate a list in HTML alone? For that functionality you need another language to generate/manipulate the HTML.. not to mention interpreting HTML for display.
replyHTML is a markup language, it's even in the name... but it's not a complete programming language by any stretch.
It's not Turing-complete, and as you say, it's a markup language and it's not general purpose. But neither is a necessary component of "programming language".
replyIfs and enumerations are a simpler requirement than Turing completeness. They're an even more basic version of giving the computer logic to evaluate.
replyExactly... it's pretty much what I consider the minimum for a "programming language" is that you need to be able to have basic state and be able to make use of state.
replyFor that matter, it wouldn't take much to get HTML to have those features... though the DOM, JS and even WASM do so well, we don't need it generally speaking.
Please explain how your edit doesn't apply to a .txt file
replyagreed, it's a hill i am very willing to die on too.
replySo is Markdown a programming language? Any logic for html, is therefore Markdown as well.
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