Open Source Projects Europe

<h1>Quick Markdown Syntax Guide</h1>

<p>The Allura code uses markdown syntax everywhere to allow you to create rich<br>text markup, and extends markdown in several ways to allow for quick linking<br>to other artifacts in your project. </p><p>Markdown was created with one goal in mind: </p>

<blockquote>

<p>Markdown is intended to be as easy-to-read and easy-to-write as is feasible.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>But the most important goal was to make it readable in its raw plain text <br>format. </p><h2>Links</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>For a URL or email, just write it like this:

<http://someurl>

<somebbob@example.com>

To use text for the link, write it [like this](http://someurl).

You can add a *title* (which shows up under the cursor),

[like this](http://someurl "this title shows up when you hover").

</pre></div>

<h2>Reference Links</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>You can also put the [link URL][1] below the current paragraph like [this][2].

   [1]: http://url

   [2]: http://another.url "A funky title"

Here the text "link URL" gets linked to "http://url", and the lines showing

"[1]: http://url" won't show anything.

Or you can use a [shortcut][] reference, which links the text "shortcut"

to the link named "[shortcut]" on the next paragraph.

   [shortcut]: http://goes/with/the/link/name/text

</pre></div>

<h2>Text</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>Use * or _ to emphasize things:

*this is in italic*  and _so is this_

**this is in bold**  and __so is this__

***this is bold and italic***  and ___so is this___

Just write paragraphs like in a text file and they will display how you would

expect.  A blank line separates paragraphs.

So this is a new paragraph. But any text on adjacent lines

will all end up

in the same paragraph.

</pre></div>

<h2>Blockquotes</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>&gt; Use the &gt; character in front of a line, *just like in email*.

> Use it if you're quoting a person, a song or whatever.

> You can use *italic* or lists inside them also.

And just like with other paragraphs,

all of these lines are still

part of the blockquote, even without the > character in front.

To end the blockquote, just put a blank line before the following paragraph.

</pre></div>

<h2>Preformatted Text</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>If you want some text to show up exactly as you write it, without Markdown

doing anything to it, just indent every line by at least 4 spaces (or 1 tab).

    This line won't *have any markdown* formatting applied.

    I can even write <b>HTML</b> and it will show up as text.

    This is great for showing program source code, or HTML or even Markdown.

    <b>this won't show up as HTML</b> but exactly <i>as you see it in

    this text file</i>.

As a shortcut you can use backquotes to do the same thing while inside

a normal pargraph.  `This won't be *italic* or **bold** at all.`

</pre></div>

<h2>Lists</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>* an asterisk starts an unordered list

* and this is another item in the list

+ or you can also use the + character

 or the - character

To start an ordered list, write this:

1. this starts a list *with* numbers

+  this will show as number "2"

*  this will show as number "3."

9. any number, +, -, or * will keep the list going.

    * just indent by 4 spaces (or tab) to make a sub-list

        1. keep indenting for more sub lists

    * here i'm back to the second level

</pre></div>

<h2>Headers</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>This is a huge header

==================

this is a smaller header

Just put 1 or more dashes or equals signs (--- or ===) below the title.

</pre></div>

<h2>Horizontal Rule</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>just put three or more *'s or -'s on a line:

or you can use single spaces between then, like this:

* * *

or

 - - - - - -

Make sure you have a blank line above the dashes, though, or else:

you will get a header

</pre></div>

<h2>Images</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>To include an image, just put a "!" in front of a text link:

![alternate text](http://someurl/image.gif)

The "alternate text" will show up if the browser can't load the image.

You can also use a title if you want, like this:

![tiny arrow](http://greg.vario.us/img/extlink.png "tiny arrow")

</pre></div>

<h2>Escapes</h2>

<p>What if you want to just show asterisks, not italics?</p>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>* this shows up in italics: *a happy day*

* this shows the asterisks: \*a happy day\*

</pre></div>

<p>The backslashes will disappear and leave the asterisks.</p>

<p>You can do the same with any of the characters that have a special meaning<br>for Markdown.</p><h2>More Headers</h2>

<div class="codehilite"><pre>More ways of doing headers:

# this is a huge header #

## this is a smaller header ##

### this is even smaller ###

#### more small ####

##### even smaller #####

###### smallest still: `<h6>` header

</pre></div>

<p>You can use up to 6 <code>#</code> characters at the beginning of the line.<br>

</p>

<h2>HTML</h2>

<p>Don't worry about special characters which need to be escaped in html. </p>

<p>You can write an ampersand &amp; a less-than sign, and they show up expected:  3 &lt; 4.</p>

<h2>Thanks</h2>

<p>Thanks to John Gruber and Aaron Swartz for creating Markdown.</p>

<p>

This page is based on some examples from Greg Schueler, <a href="mailto:greg@vario.us">greg@vario.us</a>

</p>