Discuss: 2021: Inclusion of new languages in `:common` set

Current decision:

• Removing with v11: apache, http, nginx, properties, coffeescript
• Adding as of 10.5: R, VB.net

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Wanted to open a new discussion for v11 (or perhaps even just 2021) regarding whether any new languages should be added to our “common” set… and hence also the default CDN distributable highlight.min.js. We can of course add at anytime (since adding is not a breaking change) but I think it’s helpful to have a yearly review.

Removing grammars however would be a breaking change so any removals will by necessity wait until v11.

There is no real criteria other than the nebulous and vague “common”… which I’ve always taken as a loose synonym for “popular”, “frequently used”, “people have heard of it”, etc…

The 2019 discussion on this: https://github.com/highlightjs/highlight.js/issues/2206

What we considered adding last time but didn’t:

• R
• Docker (too much “system” and not enough “common”)
• PowerShell

What almost got cut last time:

• CoffeeScript (waning popularity)

Things we should probably add for parity:

• Node REPL (javascript is already common)

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The current full :common list:

apache
bash
c
coffeescript
cpp
csharp
css
diff
go
http
ini
java
javascript
json
kotlin
less
lua
makefile
markdown
nginx
objectivec
perl
php-template
php
properties
python-repl
python
ruby
rust
scss
shell
sql
swift
typescript
xml
yaml

[joshgoebel]

So then:

• Removing with v11: apache, http, nginx, properties, coffeescript
• Adding immediately: R, VB.net

No objection to keeping ini, so it’ll stay.

[joshgoebel]

Closing per above conclusions.