User Contributed Dictionary
Extensive Definition
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.
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
hashes 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:

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
External links
- Official
website, featuring full overview and exhaustive syntax
reference.
- Markdown test cases for developers
- Markdown wiki at infogami
Additional implementations
- Babelmark tool for comparing implementations
- C#: Markdown.NET
- C: markdown
- ColdFusion: CFX_Markdown
- Common Lisp: cl-markdown
- Haskell: Pandoc
- Java: markdownj
- JavaScript: Showdown
- Lua: markdown.lua
- newLISP: markdown-newlisp
- Perl: Text::Markdown
- PHP: PHP Markdown
- Python: python-markdown and python-markdown2
- Ruby: BlueCloth
- Ruby: Maruku
Extensions
The following packages implement Markdown and
also extend it with additional functionality:
- MultiMarkdown (Perl)
- PHP Markdown Extra
- python-markdown2 (supports some of the extensions of PHP Markdown)
- python-markdown (has an extension system for adding new syntax)
- Markout (Java)
- Maruku (Ruby)
- Pandoc (Haskell): see Pandoc’s markdown vs. standard markdown
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
- Markdown Cheat Sheet at Ollieman.net
Converters
- HTML to Markdown
- html2text.py (in Python)
- Markdownify (in PHP)
- Make.text (a bookmarklet which converts any web page into Markdown.)
- XHTML-to-Markdown XSLT (a stylesheet, works with XHTML only)
- Pandoc (a Haskell library that can convert between many formats including Markdown, HTML, reStructuredText, LaTeX, and others)
- Other formats to Markdown
- Pandoc (a Haskell library that can convert between many formats including Markdown, HTML, reStructuredText, LaTeX, and others)
- odt2txt (a Python script to convert OpenDocument text files to Markdown)
- word_markdown_macro (a Microsoft Word macro that converts some of Word's formatting into Markdown)
Web publishing software using Markdown (server-side support)
- Wiki:
- Weblog:
- Blojsom (via the Markdown plugin)
- Blosxom (via the Markdown plugin)
- Frog CMS (via the Markdown plugin)
- Mephisto
- Movable Type (via the Markdown plugin)
- NanoBlogger (via the Markdown plugin)
- Textpattern (see "Textile replacement" at the PHP Markdown page)
- Tumblr
- Typo
- Wordpress (via the Markdown plugin)
- WCMS
- Drupal - see Marksmarty module
- Plone - (Native support in Plone 3)
- 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 or Maruku required -- see Markdown on Rails)
- refbase
Text editor support
- General-purpose editors: TextMate (Built into the Automation system), BBEdit (as of version 8.6), SubEthaEdit (through a user-contributed mode, from Chris Biagini), Vim (text editor) (through a user-contributed mode, from Ben Williams), Emacs, TextWrangler, Smultron
- Weblog editors: Ecto, MarsEdit
- A plugin is available for the Eclipse (software) editor, from ThinkTank Mathematics.
- Scrivener from Literature and Latte for Mac OS X
markdown in Spanish: Markdown
markdown in French: Markdown
markdown in Portuguese: Markdown
markdown in Russian: Markdown
Synonyms, Antonyms and Related Words
break,
cheapening, cut, decline, deflation, depreciation, devaluation, dive, lowering, nose dive, plummet, plummeting, plunge, price cut, price fall,
price reduction, reduction, sag, slash, slump