<h1>Markdown: Basics</h1>
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<li><a href="/projects/markdown/syntax" title="Markdown Syntax Documentation">Syntax</a></li>
<li><a href="/projects/markdown/license" title="Pricing and License Information">License</a></li>
<li><a href="/projects/markdown/dingus" title="Online Markdown Web Form">Dingus</a></li>
</ul>
<h2>Getting the Gist of Markdown's Formatting Syntax</h2>
<p>This page offers a brief overview of what it's like to use Markdown.
The <a href="/projects/markdown/syntax" title="Markdown Syntax">syntax page</a> provides complete, detailed documentation for
every feature, but Markdown should be very easy to pick up simply by
looking at a few examples of it in action. The examples on this page
are written in a before/after style, showing example syntax and the
HTML output produced by Markdown.</p>
<p>It's also helpful to simply try Markdown out; the <a href="/projects/markdown/dingus" title="Markdown Dingus">Dingus</a> is a
web application that allows you type your own Markdown-formatted text
and translate it to XHTML.</p>
<p><strong>Note:</strong> This document is itself written using Markdown; you
can <a href="/projects/markdown/basics.text">see the source for it by adding '.text' to the URL</a>.</p>
<h2>Paragraphs, Headers, Blockquotes</h2>
<p>A paragraph is simply one or more consecutive lines of text, separated
by one or more blank lines. (A blank line is any line that looks like a
blank line -- a line containing nothing spaces or tabs is considered
blank.) Normal paragraphs should not be intended with spaces or tabs.</p>
<p>Markdown offers two styles of headers: <em>Setext</em> and <em>atx</em>.
Setext-style headers for <code><h1></code> and <code><h2></code> are created by
"underlining" with equal signs (<code>=</code>) and hyphens (<code>-</code>), respectively.
To create an atx-style header, you put 1-6 hash marks (<code>#</code>) at the
beginning of the line -- the number of hashes equals the resulting
HTML header level.</p>
<p>Blockquotes are indicated using email-style '<code>></code>' angle brackets.</p>
<p>Markdown:</p>
<pre><code>A First Level Header
====================
A Second Level Header
---------------------
Now is the time for all good men to come to
the aid of their country. This is just a
regular paragraph.
The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy
dog's back.
### Header 3
> This is a blockquote.
>
> This is the second paragraph in the blockquote.
>
> ## This is an H2 in a blockquote
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><h1>A First Level Header</h1>
<h2>A Second Level Header</h2>
<p>Now is the time for all good men to come to
the aid of their country. This is just a
regular paragraph.</p>
<p>The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy
dog's back.</p>
<h3>Header 3</h3>
<blockquote>
<p>This is a blockquote.</p>
<p>This is the second paragraph in the blockquote.</p>
<h2>This is an H2 in a blockquote</h2>
</blockquote>
</code></pre>
<h3>Phrase Emphasis</h3>
<p>Markdown uses asterisks and underscores to indicate spans of emphasis.</p>
<p>Markdown:</p>
<pre><code>Some of these words *are emphasized*.
Some of these words _are emphasized also_.
Use two asterisks for **strong emphasis**.
Or, if you prefer, __use two underscores instead__.
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><p>Some of these words <em>are emphasized</em>.
Some of these words <em>are emphasized also</em>.</p>
<p>Use two asterisks for <strong>strong emphasis</strong>.
Or, if you prefer, <strong>use two underscores instead</strong>.</p>
</code></pre>
<h2>Lists</h2>
<p>Unordered (bulleted) lists use asterisks, pluses, and hyphens (<code>*</code>,
<code>+</code>, and <code>-</code>) as list markers. These three markers are
interchangable; this:</p>
<pre><code>* Candy.
* Gum.
* Booze.
</code></pre>
<p>this:</p>
<pre><code>+ Candy.
+ Gum.
+ Booze.
</code></pre>
<p>and this:</p>
<pre><code>- Candy.
- Gum.
- Booze.
</code></pre>
<p>all produce the same output:</p>
<pre><code><ul>
<li>Candy.</li>
<li>Gum.</li>
<li>Booze.</li>
</ul>
</code></pre>
<p>Ordered (numbered) lists use regular numbers, followed by periods, as
list markers:</p>
<pre><code>1. Red
2. Green
3. Blue
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><ol>
<li>Red</li>
<li>Green</li>
<li>Blue</li>
</ol>
</code></pre>
<p>If you put blank lines between items, you'll get <code><p></code> tags for the
list item text. You can create multi-paragraph list items by indenting
the paragraphs by 4 spaces or 1 tab:</p>
<pre><code>* A list item.
With multiple paragraphs.
* Another item in the list.
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><ul>
<li><p>A list item.</p>
<p>With multiple paragraphs.</p></li>
<li><p>Another item in the list.</p></li>
</ul>
</code></pre>
<h3>Links</h3>
<p>Markdown supports two styles for creating links: <em>inline</em> and
<em>reference</em>. With both styles, you use square brackets to delimit the
text you want to turn into a link.</p>
<p>Inline-style links use parentheses immediately after the link text.
For example:</p>
<pre><code>This is an [example link](http://example.com/).
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><p>This is an <a href="http://example.com/">
example link</a>.</p>
</code></pre>
<p>Optionally, you may include a title attribute in the parentheses:</p>
<pre><code>This is an [example link](http://example.com/ "With a Title").
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><p>This is an <a href="http://example.com/" title="With a Title">
example link</a>.</p>
</code></pre>
<p>Reference-style links allow you to refer to your links by names, which
you define elsewhere in your document:</p>
<pre><code>I get 10 times more traffic from [Google][1] than from
[Yahoo][2] or [MSN][3].
[1]: http://google.com/ "Google"
[2]: http://search.yahoo.com/ "Yahoo Search"
[3]: http://search.msn.com/ "MSN Search"
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><p>I get 10 times more traffic from <a href="http://google.com/"
title="Google">Google</a> than from <a href="http://search.yahoo.com/"
title="Yahoo Search">Yahoo</a> or <a href="http://search.msn.com/"
title="MSN Search">MSN</a>.</p>
</code></pre>
<p>The title attribute is optional. Link names may contain letters,
numbers and spaces, but are <em>not</em> case sensitive:</p>
<pre><code>I start my morning with a cup of coffee and
[The New York Times][NY Times].
[ny times]: http://www.nytimes.com/
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><p>I start my morning with a cup of coffee and
<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/">The New York Times</a>.</p>
</code></pre>
<h3>Images</h3>
<p>Image syntax is very much like link syntax.</p>
<p>Inline (titles are optional):</p>
<pre><code>
</code></pre>
<p>Reference-style:</p>
<pre><code>![alt text][id]
[id]: /path/to/img.jpg "Title"
</code></pre>
<p>Both of the above examples produce the same output:</p>
<pre><code><img src="/path/to/img.jpg" alt="alt text" title="Title" />
</code></pre>
<h3>Code</h3>
<p>In a regular paragraph, you can create code span by wrapping text in
backtick quotes. Any ampersands (<code>&</code>) and angle brackets (<code><</code> or
<code>></code>) will automatically be translated into HTML entities. This makes
it easy to use Markdown to write about HTML example code:</p>
<pre><code>I strongly recommend against using any `<blink>` tags.
I wish SmartyPants used named entities like `&mdash;`
instead of decimal-encoded entites like `&#8212;`.
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><p>I strongly recommend against using any
<code>&lt;blink&gt;</code> tags.</p>
<p>I wish SmartyPants used named entities like
<code>&amp;mdash;</code> instead of decimal-encoded
entites like <code>&amp;#8212;</code>.</p>
</code></pre>
<p>To specify an entire block of pre-formatted code, indent every line of
the block by 4 spaces or 1 tab. Just like with code spans, <code>&</code>, <code><</code>,
and <code>></code> characters will be escaped automatically.</p>
<p>Markdown:</p>
<pre><code>If you want your page to validate under XHTML 1.0 Strict,
you've got to put paragraph tags in your blockquotes:
<blockquote>
<p>For example.</p>
</blockquote>
</code></pre>
<p>Output:</p>
<pre><code><p>If you want your page to validate under XHTML 1.0 Strict,
you've got to put paragraph tags in your blockquotes:</p>
<pre><code>&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For example.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;
</code></pre>
</code></pre>