ISSUE-171: Dash as Marker for Unordered List ¶

1 Status ¶

	Date	Status
	17-05-2026	Proposed
	17-05-2026	Accepted
▶	17-05-2026	Implemented

2 Context ¶

Initially the only "*" markers were implemented in the Almirah Ruby gem for bullet lists (unordered lilsts). However Markdown format allows to use both "*" and "-" fur such purpose.

3 Decision ¶

It would be good to add the support of "-" along as "*".

4 Scope ¶

Item	Status	Start Date	Target Date	Description
Requirements	Done	17-05-2026	17-05-2026	SRS-017 updated to allow "*" or "-" as the item marker
Code	Done	17-05-2026	17-05-2026	Dash support added in doc_parser.rb and markdown_list.rb
Tests	Done	17-05-2026	17-05-2026	Five new unit tests in doc_parser_spec.rb; `<REQ>` traces added for SRS-017, SRS-019, SRS-024

5 Out of Scope ¶

Not identified

6 Consequences ¶

6.1 Positive ¶

Existing ADR-170 will be parsed correctly.
In most of the cases I see the "-" instead of "*" in bullet lists, so there will be less rework efforts.

6.2 Negative ¶

Not identified.

6.3 Neutral ¶

The unordered-list continuation regex was anchored to start-of-line and tightened to require whitespace after the marker. This is stricter than the previous regex for "*" as well, and closes a latent edge case where mid-paragraph "*" could be read as a list continuation.

7 Alternatives Considered ¶

No alternatives were considered

8 Proposed Changes ¶

Broaden the unordered-list entry-point regex in the document parser to match either * or - followed by a space.
Update the MarkdownList.unordered_list_item? class method so list continuation lines starting with - are recognised.
Extend the marker state in MarkdownList#calculate_text_position to treat - as a list-item marker alongside *.
Add unit tests for - as a top-level marker, for mixed */- nested lists, and for - items with bold/italic formatting.
Update the SRS-017 example to show that both * and - are valid unordered-list markers.
Verify ADR-170 renders correctly after the change (it already uses - for its Positive / Negative / Neutral bullets).

9 Software Versions ¶

Software Version Category	Software Version ID
Latest Released Version	0.3.1
Issue Found in Version	0.3.1
Target Release Version	0.4.0

10 References ¶

n/a