Markdown

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Markdown is a lightweight markup language, originally created by John Gruber and Aaron Swartz, which aims for maximum readability and "publishability" of both its input and output forms, taking many cues from existing conventions for marking up plain text in email. Markdown converts its marked-up text input to valid, well-formed XHTML and replaces left-pointing angle brackets ('<') and ampersands with their corresponding character entity references. Markdown was originally implemented in Perl by Gruber, but has since been re-implemented by others in a variety of programming languages (see below for list). It is distributed under a BSD-style license and is included with, or available as a plugin for, several content-management systems.

Contents 1 Syntax examples 2 See also 3 External links 3.1 Additional implementations 3.2 Extensions 3.3 Syntax Guides 3.4 Converters 3.5 Web publishing software using Markdown (server-side support) 3.6 Text editor support

[edit] Syntax examples

This is not an exhaustive listing of Markdown's syntax, and in many cases multiple styles of syntax are available to accomplish a particular effect. See the full Markdown syntax for more information. Characters which are ordinarily interpreted by Markdown as formatting commands will instead be interpreted literally if preceded by a backslash; for example, the sequence '\*' would output an asterisk rather than beginning a span of emphasized text. Markdown also does not transform any text within a "raw" block-level XHTML element; thus it is possible to include sections of XHTML within a Markdown source document by wrapping them in block-level XHTML tags.

Emphasized text:

*emphasis* (e.g., italics)

**strong emphasis** (e.g., boldface)

Code:

`code`

Lists:

* An item in a bulleted (unordered) list
* Another item in a bulleted list

1. An item in an enumerated (ordered) list
2. Another item in an enumerated list

Headings:

HTML headings are produced by placing a number of pound signs before the header text corresponding to the level of heading desired (HTML offers six levels of headings), like so:

# First-level heading

#### Fourth-level heading

The first two heading levels also have an alternate syntax:

First-level heading
===================

Second-level heading
--------------------

Blockquotes:

> This text will be enclosed in an HTML blockquote element.

Links:

[link text here](link.address.here "link title here")

Images:

![Alt text here](Image URL here "Image title here")

[edit] See also

• Markdown Extra
• SmartyPants, a text filter which implements certain typographic niceties, also by John Gruber and often used in conjunction with Markdown.
• List of lightweight markup languages

[edit] External links

• Official website, featuring full overview and exhaustive syntax reference.
  • Markdown test cases for developers
• Markdown wiki at infogami

[edit] Additional implementations

• C#: Markdown.NET
• ColdFusion: CFX_Markdown
• Common Lisp: cl-markdown
• Java: markdownj
• JavaScript: js-markdown (partial implementation)
• Lua: markdown.lua
• Perl: Text::Markdown
• PHP: PHP Markdown
• Python: python-markdown
• Ruby: BlueCloth

[edit] Extensions

The following packages implement Markdown and also extend it with additional functionality:

• MultiMarkdown (Perl)
• PHP Markdown Extra
• python-markdown (see listing above; this package also implements an extension system for adding new syntax)

[edit] Syntax Guides

• Markdown: Dingus online converter
• Markdown cheat sheet
• Quick Markdown Syntax Guide
• Markdown and PHP Markdown Extra Cheat Sheet includes additions in PHP Markdown Extra
• Simple Markdown Syntax Reference plain text/html toggle

[edit] Converters

• HTML to Markdown
  • html2text.py (in Python)
  • html2text.php (in PHP)
  • XHTML-to-Markdown XSLT (a stylesheet, works with XHTML only)
• Other formats to Markdown
  • odt2txt (a Python script to convert OpenDocument text files to Markdown)

[edit] Web publishing software using Markdown (server-side support)

• Wiki:
  • DokuWiki (via plugin)
  • ikiwiki
  • Infogami
  • Instiki
  • Oddmuse (via external module)
• Weblog:
  • Blojsom (via the Markdown plugin)
  • Blosxom (via the Markdown plugin)
  • Mephisto
  • Movable Type (via the Markdown plugin)
  • Textpattern (see "Textile replacement" at the PHP Markdown page)
  • Typo
  • Wordpress (via the Markdown plugin)
• WCMS
  • Drupal (via module)
  • CoalEngine (Native Support)
• Web application frameworks:
  • Django (separate download/install of python-markdown required -- see django.contrib.markup for details)
  • Ruby on Rails (separate download/install of BlueCloth required -- see Markdown on Rails)

[edit] Text editor support

• General-purpose editors: TextMate (Built into the Automation system)
• Weblog editors: Ecto, MarsEdit