Description
Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
During collaborative writing, co-authors should be able to "suggest" changes to text, such that the main author can easily accept, or modify, or decline that change.
Currently, there are only indirect ways to enable such a workflow, e.g., via in-line comments.
Describe the solution you'd like
Essentially, enable a similar workflow like LibreOffice's track changes feature: Offer an "editor mode" next to the "author mode", where:
- The suggested changes should be marked with a background color and strike-through text.
- The time of the (suggested) change and its author should be visible, e.g., by placing the cursor into the marked change, or inside a dedicated side-view.
Any author can then subsequently accept the change as-is, modify it, or decline it (resetting to the state before the suggestion was made).
(If possible, this tracking-changes-metadata should be trackable in the associated Git repo..)
Describe alternatives you've considered
In my opinion, there is no realistic alternative, since authors are accustomed to this workflow for decades.
Additional context
Our group is evaluating options for collaborative, web- and text-based writing tools. We consider the ability to "track changes" a hard requirement, because in our experience (psychology), virtually all academic writing among multiple authors relies on this feature. This is related to, but different from, an ability to comment about the text, as discussed in issue #649.
(Of course, a fully Git-based workflow would technically enable this, but it's rare to write with a team that can handle such a workflow. We hope CoCalc can support the "expected" track-changes workflow in the future. Maybe the feauture could be implemented using hunks of Git diffs..?)