NAME¶
pandoc_markdown - markdown syntax for
pandoc(1)
DESCRIPTION¶
Pandoc understands an extended and slightly revised version of John Gruber's
markdown syntax. This document explains the syntax, noting differences from
standard markdown. Except where noted, these differences can be suppressed by
using the markdown_strict format instead of markdown. An extensions can be
enabled by adding +EXTENSION to the format name and disabled by adding
-EXTENSION. For example, markdown_strict+footnotes is strict markdown with
footnotes enabled, while markdown-footnotes-pipe_tables is pandoc's markdown
without footnotes or pipe tables.
PHILOSOPHY¶
Markdown is designed to be easy to write, and, even more importantly, easy to
read:
A Markdown-formatted document should be publishable as-is, as plain text,
without looking like it's been marked up with tags or formatting instructions.
-- John Gruber
This principle has guided pandoc's decisions in finding syntax for tables,
footnotes, and other extensions.
There is, however, one respect in which pandoc's aims are different from the
original aims of markdown. Whereas markdown was originally designed with HTML
generation in mind, pandoc is designed for multiple output formats. Thus,
while pandoc allows the embedding of raw HTML, it discourages it, and provides
other, non-HTMLish ways of representing important document elements like
definition lists, tables, mathematics, and footnotes.
PARAGRAPHS¶
A paragraph is one or more lines of text followed by one or more blank line.
Newlines are treated as spaces, so you can reflow your paragraphs as you like.
If you need a hard line break, put two or more spaces at the end of a line.
Extension: escaped_line_breaks
A backslash followed by a newline is also a hard line break. Note: in multiline
and grid table cells, this is the only way to create a hard line break, since
trailing spaces in the cells are ignored.
There are two kinds of headers, Setext and atx.
A setext-style header is a line of text "underlined" with a row of =
signs (for a level one header) or - signs (for a level two header):
-
A level-one header
==================
A level-two header
------------------
The header text can contain inline formatting, such as emphasis (see Inline
formatting, below).
An Atx-style header consists of one to six # signs and a line of text,
optionally followed by any number of # signs. The number of # signs at the
beginning of the line is the header level:
-
## A level-two header
### A level-three header ###
As with setext-style headers, the header text can contain formatting:
-
# A level-one header with a [link](/url) and *emphasis*
Extension: blank_before_header
Standard markdown syntax does not require a blank line before a header. Pandoc
does require this (except, of course, at the beginning of the document). The
reason for the requirement is that it is all too easy for a # to end up at the
beginning of a line by accident (perhaps through line wrapping). Consider, for
example:
-
I like several of their flavors of ice cream:
#22, for example, and #5.
Header identifiers in HTML, LaTeX, and ConTeXt¶
Extension: header_attributes
Headers can be assigned attributes using this syntax at the end of the line
containing the header text:
-
{#identifier .class .class key=value key=value}
Although this syntax allows assignment of classes and key/value attributes, only
identifiers currently have any affect in the writers (and only in some
writers: HTML, LaTeX, ConTeXt, Textile, AsciiDoc). Thus, for example, the
following headers will all be assigned the identifier foo:
-
# My header {#foo}
## My header ## {#foo}
My other header {#foo}
---------------
(This syntax is compatible with PHP Markdown Extra.)
Headers with the class unnumbered will not be numbered, even if
--number-sections is specified. A single hyphen (-) in an attribute context is
equivalent to .unnumbered, and preferable in non-English documents. So,
-
# My header {-}
is just the same as
-
# My header {.unnumbered}
Extension: auto_identifiers
A header without an explicitly specified identifier will be automatically
assigned a unique identifier based on the header text. To derive the
identifier from the header text,
- •
- Remove all formatting, links, etc.
- •
- Remove all footnotes.
- •
- Remove all punctuation, except underscores, hyphens, and periods.
- •
- Replace all spaces and newlines with hyphens.
- •
- Convert all alphabetic characters to lowercase.
- •
- Remove everything up to the first letter (identifiers may not begin with a
number or punctuation mark).
- •
- If nothing is left after this, use the identifier section.
Thus, for example,
Header |
Identifier |
|
Header identifiers in HTML |
header-identifiers-in-html |
Dogs?--in my house? |
dogs--in-my-house |
HTML, S5, or RTF? |
html-s5-or-rtf |
3. Applications |
applications |
33 |
section |
These rules should, in most cases, allow one to determine the identifier from
the header text. The exception is when several headers have the same text; in
this case, the first will get an identifier as described above; the second
will get the same identifier with -1 appended; the third with -2; and so on.
These identifiers are used to provide link targets in the table of contents
generated by the --toc|--table-of-contents option. They also make it easy to
provide links from one section of a document to another. A link to this
section, for example, might look like this:
-
See the section on
[header identifiers](#header-identifiers-in-html-latex-and-context).
Note, however, that this method of providing links to sections works only in
HTML, LaTeX, and ConTeXt formats.
If the --section-divs option is specified, then each section will be wrapped in
a div (or a section, if --html5 was specified), and the identifier will be
attached to the enclosing <div> (or <section>) tag rather than the
header itself. This allows entire sections to be manipulated using javascript
or treated differently in CSS.
Extension: implicit_header_references
Pandoc behaves as if reference links have been defined for each header. So,
instead of
-
[header identifiers](#header-identifiers-in-html)
you can simply write
-
[header identifiers]
or
-
[header identifiers][]
or
-
[the section on header identifiers][header identifiers]
If there are multiple headers with identical text, the corresponding reference
will link to the first one only, and you will need to use explicit links to
link to the others, as described above.
Unlike regular reference links, these references are case-sensitive.
Note: if you have defined an explicit identifier for a header, then implicit
references to it will not work.
BLOCK QUOTATIONS¶
Markdown uses email conventions for quoting blocks of text. A block quotation is
one or more paragraphs or other block elements (such as lists or headers),
with each line preceded by a > character and a space. (The > need not
start at the left margin, but it should not be indented more than three
spaces.)
-
> This is a block quote. This
> paragraph has two lines.
>
> 1. This is a list inside a block quote.
> 2. Second item.
A "lazy" form, which requires the > character only on the first
line of each block, is also allowed:
-
> This is a block quote. This
paragraph has two lines.
> 1. This is a list inside a block quote.
2. Second item.
Among the block elements that can be contained in a block quote are other block
quotes. That is, block quotes can be nested:
-
> This is a block quote.
>
> > A block quote within a block quote.
Extension: blank_before_blockquote
Standard markdown syntax does not require a blank line before a block quote.
Pandoc does require this (except, of course, at the beginning of the
document). The reason for the requirement is that it is all too easy for a
> to end up at the beginning of a line by accident (perhaps through line
wrapping). So, unless the markdown_strict format is used, the following does
not produce a nested block quote in pandoc:
-
> This is a block quote.
>> Nested.
VERBATIM (CODE) BLOCKS¶
Indented code blocks¶
A block of text indented four spaces (or one tab) is treated as verbatim text:
that is, special characters do not trigger special formatting, and all spaces
and line breaks are preserved. For example,
-
if (a > 3) {
moveShip(5 * gravity, DOWN);
}
The initial (four space or one tab) indentation is not considered part of the
verbatim text, and is removed in the output.
Note: blank lines in the verbatim text need not begin with four spaces.
Fenced code blocks¶
Extension: fenced_code_blocks
In addition to standard indented code blocks, Pandoc supports
fenced code
blocks. These begin with a row of three or more tildes (~) or backticks (`)
and end with a row of tildes or backticks that must be at least as long as the
starting row. Everything between these lines is treated as code. No
indentation is necessary:
-
~~~~~~~
if (a > 3) {
moveShip(5 * gravity, DOWN);
}
~~~~~~~
Like regular code blocks, fenced code blocks must be separated from surrounding
text by blank lines.
If the code itself contains a row of tildes or backticks, just use a longer row
of tildes or backticks at the start and end:
-
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~
code including tildes
~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Optionally, you may attach attributes to the code block using this syntax:
-
~~~~ {#mycode .haskell .numberLines startFrom="100"}
qsort [] = []
qsort (x:xs) = qsort (filter (< x) xs) ++ [x] ++
qsort (filter (>= x) xs)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Here mycode is an identifier, haskell and numberLines are classes, and startFrom
is an attribute with value 100. Some output formats can use this information
to do syntax highlighting. Currently, the only output formats that uses this
information are HTML and LaTeX. If highlighting is supported for your output
format and language, then the code block above will appear highlighted, with
numbered lines. (To see which languages are supported, do
pandoc --version.) Otherwise, the code block above will appear as
follows:
-
<pre id="mycode" class="haskell numberLines" startFrom="100">
<code>
...
</code>
</pre>
A shortcut form can also be used for specifying the language of the code block:
-
```haskell
qsort [] = []
```
This is equivalent to:
-
``` {.haskell}
qsort [] = []
```
To prevent all highlighting, use the --no-highlight flag. To set the
highlighting style, use --highlight-style.
LINE BLOCKS¶
Extension: line_blocks
A line block is a sequence of lines beginning with a vertical bar (|) followed
by a space. The division into lines will be preserved in the output, as will
any leading spaces; otherwise, the lines will be formatted as markdown. This
is useful for verse and addresses:
-
| The limerick packs laughs anatomical
| In space that is quite economical.
| But the good ones I've seen
| So seldom are clean
| And the clean ones so seldom are comical
| 200 Main St.
| Berkeley, CA 94718
The lines can be hard-wrapped if needed, but the continuation line must begin
with a space.
-
| The Right Honorable Most Venerable and Righteous Samuel L.
Constable, Jr.
| 200 Main St.
| Berkeley, CA 94718
This syntax is borrowed from reStructuredText.
LISTS¶
Bullet lists¶
A bullet list is a list of bulleted list items. A bulleted list item begins with
a bullet (*, +, or -). Here is a simple example:
-
* one
* two
* three
This will produce a "compact" list. If you want a "loose"
list, in which each item is formatted as a paragraph, put spaces between the
items:
-
* one
* two
* three
The bullets need not be flush with the left margin; they may be indented one,
two, or three spaces. The bullet must be followed by whitespace.
List items look best if subsequent lines are flush with the first line (after
the bullet):
-
* here is my first
list item.
* and my second.
But markdown also allows a "lazy" format:
-
* here is my first
list item.
* and my second.
The four-space rule¶
A list item may contain multiple paragraphs and other block-level content.
However, subsequent paragraphs must be preceded by a blank line and indented
four spaces or a tab. The list will look better if the first paragraph is
aligned with the rest:
-
* First paragraph.
Continued.
* Second paragraph. With a code block, which must be indented
eight spaces:
{ code }
List items may include other lists. In this case the preceding blank line is
optional. The nested list must be indented four spaces or one tab:
-
* fruits
+ apples
- macintosh
- red delicious
+ pears
+ peaches
* vegetables
+ broccoli
+ chard
As noted above, markdown allows you to write list items "lazily,"
instead of indenting continuation lines. However, if there are multiple
paragraphs or other blocks in a list item, the first line of each must be
indented.
-
+ A lazy, lazy, list
item.
+ Another one; this looks
bad but is legal.
Second paragraph of second
list item.
Note: Although the four-space rule for continuation paragraphs comes from
the official markdown syntax guide, the reference implementation, Markdown.pl,
does not follow it. So pandoc will give different results than Markdown.pl
when authors have indented continuation paragraphs fewer than four spaces.
The markdown syntax guide is not explicit whether the four-space rule applies to
all block-level content in a list item; it only mentions paragraphs and
code blocks. But it implies that the rule applies to all block-level content
(including nested lists), and pandoc interprets it that way.
Ordered lists¶
Ordered lists work just like bulleted lists, except that the items begin with
enumerators rather than bullets.
In standard markdown, enumerators are decimal numbers followed by a period and a
space. The numbers themselves are ignored, so there is no difference between
this list:
-
1. one
2. two
3. three
and this one:
-
5. one
7. two
1. three
Extension: fancy_lists
Unlike standard markdown, Pandoc allows ordered list items to be marked with
uppercase and lowercase letters and roman numerals, in addition to arabic
numerals. List markers may be enclosed in parentheses or followed by a single
right-parentheses or period. They must be separated from the text that follows
by at least one space, and, if the list marker is a capital letter with a
period, by at least two spaces.[1]
The fancy_lists extension also allows '#' to be used as an ordered list marker
in place of a numeral:
-
#. one
#. two
Extension: startnum
Pandoc also pays attention to the type of list marker used, and to the starting
number, and both of these are preserved where possible in the output format.
Thus, the following yields a list with numbers followed by a single
parenthesis, starting with 9, and a sublist with lowercase roman numerals:
-
9) Ninth
10) Tenth
11) Eleventh
i. subone
ii. subtwo
iii. subthree
Pandoc will start a new list each time a different type of list marker is used.
So, the following will create three lists:
-
(2) Two
(5) Three
1. Four
* Five
If default list markers are desired, use #.:
-
#. one
#. two
#. three
Definition lists¶
Extension: definition_lists
Pandoc supports definition lists, using a syntax inspired by PHP Markdown Extra
and reStructuredText:[2]
-
Term 1
: Definition 1
Term 2 with *inline markup*
: Definition 2
{ some code, part of Definition 2 }
Third paragraph of definition 2.
Each term must fit on one line, which may optionally be followed by a blank
line, and must be followed by one or more definitions. A definition begins
with a colon or tilde, which may be indented one or two spaces. The body of
the definition (including the first line, aside from the colon or tilde)
should be indented four spaces. A term may have multiple definitions, and each
definition may consist of one or more block elements (paragraph, code block,
list, etc.), each indented four spaces or one tab stop.
If you leave space after the definition (as in the example above), the blocks of
the definitions will be considered paragraphs. In some output formats, this
will mean greater spacing between term/definition pairs. For a compact
definition list, do not leave space between the definition and the next term:
-
Term 1
~ Definition 1
Term 2
~ Definition 2a
~ Definition 2b
Numbered example lists¶
Extension: example_lists
The special list marker @ can be used for sequentially numbered examples. The
first list item with a @ marker will be numbered '1', the next '2', and so on,
throughout the document. The numbered examples need not occur in a single
list; each new list using @ will take up where the last stopped. So, for
example:
-
(@) My first example will be numbered (1).
(@) My second example will be numbered (2).
Explanation of examples.
(@) My third example will be numbered (3).
Numbered examples can be labeled and referred to elsewhere in the document:
-
(@good) This is a good example.
As (@good) illustrates, ...
The label can be any string of alphanumeric characters, underscores, or hyphens.
Compact and loose lists¶
Pandoc behaves differently from Markdown.pl on some "edge cases"
involving lists. Consider this source:
-
+ First
+ Second:
- Fee
- Fie
- Foe
+ Third
Pandoc transforms this into a "compact list" (with no <p> tags
around "First", "Second", or "Third"), while
markdown puts <p> tags around "Second" and "Third"
(but not "First"), because of the blank space around
"Third". Pandoc follows a simple rule: if the text is followed by a
blank line, it is treated as a paragraph. Since "Second" is followed
by a list, and not a blank line, it isn't treated as a paragraph. The fact
that the list is followed by a blank line is irrelevant. (Note: Pandoc works
this way even when the markdown_strict format is specified. This behavior is
consistent with the official markdown syntax description, even though it is
different from that of Markdown.pl.)
Ending a list¶
What if you want to put an indented code block after a list?
-
- item one
- item two
{ my code block }
Trouble! Here pandoc (like other markdown implementations) will treat
{ my code block } as the second paragraph of item
two, and not as a code block.
To "cut off" the list after item two, you can insert some non-indented
content, like an HTML comment, which won't produce visible output in any
format:
-
- item one
- item two
<!-- end of list -->
{ my code block }
You can use the same trick if you want two consecutive lists instead of one big
list:
-
1. one
2. two
3. three
<!-- -->
1. uno
2. dos
3. tres
HORIZONTAL RULES¶
A line containing a row of three or more *, -, or _ characters (optionally
separated by spaces) produces a horizontal rule:
-
* * * *
---------------
TABLES¶
Four kinds of tables may be used. The first three kinds presuppose the use of a
fixed-width font, such as Courier. The fourth kind can be used with
proportionally spaced fonts, as it does not require lining up columns.
Simple tables¶
Extension: simple_tables, table_captions
Simple tables look like this:
-
Right Left Center Default
------- ------ ---------- -------
12 12 12 12
123 123 123 123
1 1 1 1
Table: Demonstration of simple table syntax.
The headers and table rows must each fit on one line. Column alignments are
determined by the position of the header text relative to the dashed line
below it:[3]
- •
- If the dashed line is flush with the header text on the right side but
extends beyond it on the left, the column is right-aligned.
- •
- If the dashed line is flush with the header text on the left side but
extends beyond it on the right, the column is left-aligned.
- •
- If the dashed line extends beyond the header text on both sides, the
column is centered.
- •
- If the dashed line is flush with the header text on both sides, the
default alignment is used (in most cases, this will be left).
The table must end with a blank line, or a line of dashes followed by a blank
line. A caption may optionally be provided (as illustrated in the example
above). A caption is a paragraph beginning with the string Table: (or just :),
which will be stripped off. It may appear either before or after the table.
The column headers may be omitted, provided a dashed line is used to end the
table. For example:
-
------- ------ ---------- -------
12 12 12 12
123 123 123 123
1 1 1 1
------- ------ ---------- -------
When headers are omitted, column alignments are determined on the basis of the
first line of the table body. So, in the tables above, the columns would be
right, left, center, and right aligned, respectively.
Multiline tables¶
Extension: multiline_tables, table_captions
Multiline tables allow headers and table rows to span multiple lines of text
(but cells that span multiple columns or rows of the table are not supported).
Here is an example:
-
-------------------------------------------------------------
Centered Default Right Left
Header Aligned Aligned Aligned
----------- ------- --------------- -------------------------
First row 12.0 Example of a row that
spans multiple lines.
Second row 5.0 Here's another one. Note
the blank line between
rows.
-------------------------------------------------------------
Table: Here's the caption. It, too, may span
multiple lines.
These work like simple tables, but with the following differences:
- •
- They must begin with a row of dashes, before the header text (unless the
headers are omitted).
- •
- They must end with a row of dashes, then a blank line.
- •
- The rows must be separated by blank lines.
In multiline tables, the table parser pays attention to the widths of the
columns, and the writers try to reproduce these relative widths in the output.
So, if you find that one of the columns is too narrow in the output, try
widening it in the markdown source.
Headers may be omitted in multiline tables as well as simple tables:
-
----------- ------- --------------- -------------------------
First row 12.0 Example of a row that
spans multiple lines.
Second row 5.0 Here's another one. Note
the blank line between
rows.
----------- ------- --------------- -------------------------
: Here's a multiline table without headers.
It is possible for a multiline table to have just one row, but the row should be
followed by a blank line (and then the row of dashes that ends the table), or
the table may be interpreted as a simple table.
Grid tables¶
Extension: grid_tables, table_captions
Grid tables look like this:
-
: Sample grid table.
+---------------+---------------+--------------------+
| Fruit | Price | Advantages |
+===============+===============+====================+
| Bananas | $1.34 | - built-in wrapper |
| | | - bright color |
+---------------+---------------+--------------------+
| Oranges | $2.10 | - cures scurvy |
| | | - tasty |
+---------------+---------------+--------------------+
The row of =s separates the header from the table body, and can be omitted for a
headerless table. The cells of grid tables may contain arbitrary block
elements (multiple paragraphs, code blocks, lists, etc.). Alignments are not
supported, nor are cells that span multiple columns or rows. Grid tables can
be created easily using Emacs table mode.
Pipe tables¶
Extension: pipe_tables, table_captions
Pipe tables look like this:
-
| Right | Left | Default | Center |
|------:|:-----|---------|:------:|
| 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 |
| 123 | 123 | 123 | 123 |
| 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
: Demonstration of simple table syntax.
The syntax is the same as in PHP markdown extra. The beginning and ending pipe
characters are optional, but pipes are required between all columns. The
colons indicate column alignment as shown. The header can be omitted, but the
horizontal line must still be included, as it defines column alignments.
Since the pipes indicate column boundaries, columns need not be vertically
aligned, as they are in the above example. So, this is a perfectly legal
(though ugly) pipe table:
-
fruit| price
-----|-----:
apple|2.05
pear|1.37
orange|3.09
The cells of pipe tables cannot contain block elements like paragraphs and
lists, and cannot span multiple lines.
Note: Pandoc also recognizes pipe tables of the following form, as can produced
by Emacs' orgtbl-mode:
-
| One | Two |
|-----+-------|
| my | table |
| is | nice |
The difference is that + is used instead of |. Other orgtbl features are not
supported. In particular, to get non-default column alignment, you'll need to
add colons as above.
TITLE BLOCK¶
Extension: pandoc_title_block
If the file begins with a title block
-
% title
% author(s) (separated by semicolons)
% date
it will be parsed as bibliographic information, not regular text. (It will be
used, for example, in the title of standalone LaTeX or HTML output.) The block
may contain just a title, a title and an author, or all three elements. If you
want to include an author but no title, or a title and a date but no author,
you need a blank line:
-
%
% Author
% My title
%
% June 15, 2006
The title may occupy multiple lines, but continuation lines must begin with
leading space, thus:
-
% My title
on multiple lines
If a document has multiple authors, the authors may be put on separate lines
with leading space, or separated by semicolons, or both. So, all of the
following are equivalent:
-
% Author One
Author Two
% Author One; Author Two
% Author One;
Author Two
The date must fit on one line.
All three metadata fields may contain standard inline formatting (italics,
links, footnotes, etc.).
Title blocks will always be parsed, but they will affect the output only when
the --standalone (-s) option is chosen. In HTML output, titles will appear
twice: once in the document head -- this is the title that will appear at the
top of the window in a browser -- and once at the beginning of the document
body. The title in the document head can have an optional prefix attached
(--title-prefix or -T option). The title in the body appears as an H1 element
with class "title", so it can be suppressed or reformatted with CSS.
If a title prefix is specified with -T and no title block appears in the
document, the title prefix will be used by itself as the HTML title.
The man page writer extracts a title, man page section number, and other header
and footer information from the title line. The title is assumed to be the
first word on the title line, which may optionally end with a (single-digit)
section number in parentheses. (There should be no space between the title and
the parentheses.) Anything after this is assumed to be additional footer and
header text. A single pipe character (|) should be used to separate the footer
text from the header text. Thus,
-
% PANDOC(1)
will yield a man page with the title PANDOC and section 1.
-
% PANDOC(1) Pandoc User Manuals
will also have "Pandoc User Manuals" in the footer.
-
% PANDOC(1) Pandoc User Manuals | Version 4.0
will also have "Version 4.0" in the header.
Extension: yaml_metadata_block
A YAML metadata block is a valid YAML object, delimited by a line of three
hyphens (---) at the top and a line of three hyphens (---) or three dots (...)
at the bottom. A YAML metadata block may occur anywhere in the document, but
if it is not at the beginning, it must be preceded by a blank line.
Metadata will be taken from the fields of the YAML object and added to any
existing document metadata. Metadata can contain lists and objects (nested
arbitrarily), but all string scalars will be interpreted as markdown. Fields
with names ending in an underscore will be ignored by pandoc. (They may be
given a role by external processors.)
A document may contain multiple metadata blocks. The metadata fields will be
combined through a
left-biased union: if two metadata blocks
attempt to set the same field, the value from the first block will be taken.
Note that YAML escaping rules must be followed. Thus, for example, if a title
contains a colon, it must be quoted. The pipe character (|) can be used to
begin an indented block that will be interpreted literally, without need for
escaping. This form is necessary when the field contains blank lines:
-
---
title: 'This is the title: it contains a colon'
author:
- name: Author One
affiliation: University of Somewhere
- name: Author Two
affiliation: University of Nowhere
tags: [nothing, nothingness]
abstract: |
This is the abstract.
It consists of two paragraphs.
...
Template variables will be set automatically from the metadata. Thus, for
example, in writing HTML, the variable abstract will be set to the HTML
equivalent of the markdown in the abstract field:
-
<p>This is the abstract.</p>
<p>It consists of two paragraphs.</p>
Note: The author variable in the default templates expects a simple list or
string. To use the structured authors in the example, you would need a custom
template. For example:
-
$for(author)$
$if(author.name)$
$author.name$$if(author.affiliation)$ ($author.affiliation$)$endif$
$else$
$author$
$endif$
$endfor$
BACKSLASH ESCAPES¶
Extension: all_symbols_escapable
Except inside a code block or inline code, any punctuation or space character
preceded by a backslash will be treated literally, even if it would normally
indicate formatting. Thus, for example, if one writes
-
*\*hello\**
one will get
-
<em>*hello*</em>
instead of
-
<strong>hello</strong>
This rule is easier to remember than standard markdown's rule, which allows only
the following characters to be backslash-escaped:
-
\`*_{}[]()>#+-.!
(However, if the markdown_strict format is used, the standard markdown rule will
be used.)
A backslash-escaped space is parsed as a nonbreaking space. It will appear in
TeX output as ~ and in HTML and XML as \  or \ .
A backslash-escaped newline (i.e. a backslash occurring at the end of a line) is
parsed as a hard line break. It will appear in TeX output as \\ and in HTML as
<br />. This is a nice alternative to markdown's
"invisible" way of indicating hard line breaks using two trailing
spaces on a line.
Backslash escapes do not work in verbatim contexts.
SMART PUNCTUATION¶
Extension
If the --smart option is specified, pandoc will produce typographically correct
output, converting straight quotes to curly quotes, --- to em-dashes, -- to
en-dashes, and ... to ellipses. Nonbreaking spaces are inserted after certain
abbreviations, such as "Mr."
Note: if your LaTeX template uses the csquotes package, pandoc will detect
automatically this and use \enquote{...} for quoted text.
Emphasis¶
To
emphasize some text, surround it with *s or _, like this:
-
This text is _emphasized with underscores_, and this
is *emphasized with asterisks*.
Double * or _ produces
strong emphasis:
-
This is **strong emphasis** and __with underscores__.
A * or _ character surrounded by spaces, or backslash-escaped, will not trigger
emphasis:
-
This is * not emphasized *, and \*neither is this\*.
Extension: intraword_underscores
Because _ is sometimes used inside words and identifiers, pandoc does not
interpret a _ surrounded by alphanumeric characters as an emphasis marker. If
you want to emphasize just part of a word, use *:
-
feas*ible*, not feas*able*.
Strikeout¶
Extension: strikeout
To strikeout a section of text with a horizontal line, begin and end it with ~~.
Thus, for example,
-
This ~~is deleted text.~~
Superscripts and subscripts¶
Extension: superscript, subscript
Superscripts may be written by surrounding the superscripted text by ^
characters; subscripts may be written by surrounding the subscripted text by ~
characters. Thus, for example,
-
H~2~O is a liquid. 2^10^ is 1024.
If the superscripted or subscripted text contains spaces, these spaces must be
escaped with backslashes. (This is to prevent accidental superscripting and
subscripting through the ordinary use of ~ and ^.) Thus, if you want the
letter P with 'a cat' in subscripts, use P~a\ cat~, not
P~a cat~.
Verbatim¶
To make a short span of text verbatim, put it inside backticks:
-
What is the difference between `>>=` and `>>`?
If the verbatim text includes a backtick, use double backticks:
-
Here is a literal backtick `` ` ``.
(The spaces after the opening backticks and before the closing backticks will be
ignored.)
The general rule is that a verbatim span starts with a string of consecutive
backticks (optionally followed by a space) and ends with a string of the same
number of backticks (optionally preceded by a space).
Note that backslash-escapes (and other markdown constructs) do not work in
verbatim contexts:
-
This is a backslash followed by an asterisk: `\*`.
Extension: inline_code_attributes
Attributes can be attached to verbatim text, just as with fenced code blocks:
-
`<$>`{.haskell}
MATH¶
Extension: tex_math_dollars
Anything between two $ characters will be treated as TeX math. The opening $
must have a character immediately to its right, while the closing $ must have
a character immediately to its left. Thus, $20,000 and $30,000
won't parse as math. If for some reason you need to enclose text in literal $
characters, backslash-escape them and they won't be treated as math
delimiters.
TeX math will be printed in all output formats. How it is rendered depends on
the output format:
- Markdown, LaTeX, Org-Mode, ConTeXt
- It will appear verbatim between $ characters.
- reStructuredText
- It will be rendered using an interpreted text role :math:, as described
here.
- AsciiDoc
- It will be rendered as latexmath:[...].
- Texinfo
- It will be rendered inside a @math command.
- groff man
- It will be rendered verbatim without $'s.
- MediaWiki
- It will be rendered inside <math> tags.
- Textile
- It will be rendered inside <span class="math">
tags.
- RTF, OpenDocument, ODT
- It will be rendered, if possible, using unicode characters, and will
otherwise appear verbatim.
- Docbook
- If the --mathml flag is used, it will be rendered using mathml in an
inlineequation or informalequation tag. Otherwise it will be rendered, if
possible, using unicode characters.
- Docx
- It will be rendered using OMML math markup.
- FictionBook2
- If the --webtex option is used, formulas are rendered as images using
Google Charts or other compatible web service, downloaded and embedded in
the e-book. Otherwise, they will appear verbatim.
- HTML, Slidy, DZSlides, S5, EPUB
- The way math is rendered in HTML will depend on the command-line options
selected:
- 1.
- The default is to render TeX math as far as possible using unicode
characters, as with RTF, DocBook, and OpenDocument output. Formulas are
put inside a span with class="math", so that they may be styled
differently from the surrounding text if needed.
- 2.
- If the --latexmathml option is used, TeX math will be displayed between $
or $$ characters and put in <span> tags with class LaTeX. The
LaTeXMathML script will be used to render it as formulas. (This trick does
not work in all browsers, but it works in Firefox. In browsers that do not
support LaTeXMathML, TeX math will appear verbatim between $
characters.)
- 3.
- If the --jsmath option is used, TeX math will be put inside <span>
tags (for inline math) or <div> tags (for display math) with class
math. The jsMath script will be used to render it.
- 4.
- If the --mimetex option is used, the mimeTeX CGI script will be called to
generate images for each TeX formula. This should work in all browsers.
The --mimetex option takes an optional URL as argument. If no URL is
specified, it will be assumed that the mimeTeX CGI script is at
/cgi-bin/mimetex.cgi.
- 5.
- If the --gladtex option is used, TeX formulas will be enclosed in
<eq> tags in the HTML output. The resulting htex file may then be
processed by gladTeX, which will produce image files for each formula and
an html file with links to these images. So, the procedure is:
-
pandoc -s --gladtex myfile.txt -o myfile.htex
gladtex -d myfile-images myfile.htex
# produces myfile.html and images in myfile-images
- 6.
- If the --webtex option is used, TeX formulas will be converted to
<img> tags that link to an external script that converts formulas to
images. The formula will be URL-encoded and concatenated with the URL
provided. If no URL is specified, the Google Chart API will be used
(http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=tx&chl=).
- 7.
- If the --mathjax option is used, TeX math will be displayed between
\(...\) (for inline math) or \[...\] (for display math) and put in
<span> tags with class math. The MathJax script will be used to
render it as formulas.
RAW HTML¶
Extension: raw_html
Markdown allows you to insert raw HTML (or DocBook) anywhere in a document
(except verbatim contexts, where <, >, and & are interpreted
literally). (Technically this is not an extension, since standard markdown
allows it, but it has been made an extension so that it can be disabled if
desired.)
The raw HTML is passed through unchanged in HTML, S5, Slidy, Slideous, DZSlides,
EPUB, Markdown, and Textile output, and suppressed in other formats.
Extension: markdown_in_html_blocks
Standard markdown allows you to include HTML "blocks": blocks of HTML
between balanced tags that are separated from the surrounding text with blank
lines, and start and end at the left margin. Within these blocks, everything
is interpreted as HTML, not markdown; so (for example), * does not signify
emphasis.
Pandoc behaves this way when the markdown_strict format is used; but by default,
pandoc interprets material between HTML block tags as markdown. Thus, for
example, Pandoc will turn
-
<table>
<tr>
<td>*one*</td>
<td>[a link](http://google.com)</td>
</tr>
</table>
into
-
<table>
<tr>
<td><em>one</em></td>
<td><a href="http://google.com">a link</a></td>
</tr>
</table>
whereas Markdown.pl will preserve it as is.
There is one exception to this rule: text between <script> and
<style> tags is not interpreted as markdown.
This departure from standard markdown should make it easier to mix markdown with
HTML block elements. For example, one can surround a block of markdown text
with <div> tags without preventing it from being interpreted as
markdown.
RAW TEX¶
Extension: raw_tex
In addition to raw HTML, pandoc allows raw LaTeX, TeX, and ConTeXt to be
included in a document. Inline TeX commands will be preserved and passed
unchanged to the LaTeX and ConTeXt writers. Thus, for example, you can use
LaTeX to include BibTeX citations:
-
This result was proved in \cite{jones.1967}.
Note that in LaTeX environments, like
-
\begin{tabular}{|l|l|}\hline
Age & Frequency \\ \hline
18--25 & 15 \\
26--35 & 33 \\
36--45 & 22 \\ \hline
\end{tabular}
the material between the begin and end tags will be interpreted as raw LaTeX,
not as markdown.
Inline LaTeX is ignored in output formats other than Markdown, LaTeX, and
ConTeXt.
LATEX MACROS¶
Extension: latex_macros
For output formats other than LaTeX, pandoc will parse LaTeX \newcommand and
\renewcommand definitions and apply the resulting macros to all LaTeX math.
So, for example, the following will work in all output formats, not just
LaTeX:
-
\newcommand{\tuple}[1]{\langle #1 \rangle}
$\tuple{a, b, c}$
In LaTeX output, the \newcommand definition will simply be passed unchanged to
the output.
LINKS¶
Markdown allows links to be specified in several ways.
Automatic links¶
If you enclose a URL or email address in pointy brackets, it will become a link:
-
<http://google.com>
<sam@green.eggs.ham>
Inline links¶
An inline link consists of the link text in square brackets, followed by the URL
in parentheses. (Optionally, the URL can be followed by a link title, in
quotes.)
-
This is an [inline link](/url), and here's [one with
a title](http://fsf.org "click here for a good time!").
There can be no space between the bracketed part and the parenthesized part. The
link text can contain formatting (such as emphasis), but the title cannot.
Reference links¶
An
explicit reference link has two parts, the link itself and the link
definition, which may occur elsewhere in the document (either before or after
the link).
The link consists of link text in square brackets, followed by a label in square
brackets. (There can be space between the two.) The link definition consists
of the bracketed label, followed by a colon and a space, followed by the URL,
and optionally (after a space) a link title either in quotes or in
parentheses.
Here are some examples:
-
[my label 1]: /foo/bar.html "My title, optional"
[my label 2]: /foo
[my label 3]: http://fsf.org (The free software foundation)
[my label 4]: /bar#special 'A title in single quotes'
The URL may optionally be surrounded by angle brackets:
-
[my label 5]: <http://foo.bar.baz>
The title may go on the next line:
-
[my label 3]: http://fsf.org
"The free software foundation"
Note that link labels are not case sensitive. So, this will work:
-
Here is [my link][FOO]
[Foo]: /bar/baz
In an
implicit reference link, the second pair of brackets is empty, or
omitted entirely:
-
See [my website][], or [my website].
[my website]: http://foo.bar.baz
Note: In Markdown.pl and most other markdown implementations, reference link
definitions cannot occur in nested constructions such as list items or block
quotes. Pandoc lifts this arbitrary seeming restriction. So the following is
fine in pandoc, though not in most other implementations:
-
> My block [quote].
>
> [quote]: /foo
Internal links¶
To link to another section of the same document, use the automatically generated
identifier (see Header identifiers in HTML, LaTeX, and ConTeXt, below). For
example:
-
See the [Introduction](#introduction).
or
-
See the [Introduction].
[Introduction]: #introduction
Internal links are currently supported for HTML formats (including HTML slide
shows and EPUB), LaTeX, and ConTeXt.
IMAGES¶
A link immediately preceded by a ! will be treated as an image. The link text
will be used as the image's alt text:
-
![la lune](lalune.jpg "Voyage to the moon")
![movie reel]
[movie reel]: movie.gif
Pictures with captions¶
Extension: implicit_figures
An image occurring by itself in a paragraph will be rendered as a figure with a
caption.[4] (In LaTeX, a figure environment will be used; in HTML, the image
will be placed in a div with class figure, together with a caption in a p with
class caption.) The image's alt text will be used as the caption.
-
![This is the caption](/url/of/image.png)
If you just want a regular inline image, just make sure it is not the only thing
in the paragraph. One way to do this is to insert a nonbreaking space after
the image:
-
![This image won't be a figure](/url/of/image.png)\
Extension: footnotes
Pandoc's markdown allows footnotes, using the following syntax:
-
Here is a footnote reference,[^1] and another.[^longnote]
[^1]: Here is the footnote.
[^longnote]: Here's one with multiple blocks.
Subsequent paragraphs are indented to show that they
belong to the previous footnote.
{ some.code }
The whole paragraph can be indented, or just the first
line. In this way, multi-paragraph footnotes work like
multi-paragraph list items.
This paragraph won't be part of the note, because it
isn't indented.
The identifiers in footnote references may not contain spaces, tabs, or
newlines. These identifiers are used only to correlate the footnote reference
with the note itself; in the output, footnotes will be numbered sequentially.
The footnotes themselves need not be placed at the end of the document. They may
appear anywhere except inside other block elements (lists, block quotes,
tables, etc.).
Extension: inline_notes
Inline footnotes are also allowed (though, unlike regular notes, they cannot
contain multiple paragraphs). The syntax is as follows:
-
Here is an inline note.^[Inlines notes are easier to write, since
you don't have to pick an identifier and move down to type the
note.]
Inline and regular footnotes may be mixed freely.
CITATIONS¶
Extension: citations
Using an external filter, pandoc-citeproc, pandoc can automatically generate
citations and a bibliography in a number of styles. Basic usage is
-
pandoc --filter pandoc-citeproc myinput.txt
In order to use this feature, you will need to specify a bibliography file using
the bibliography metadata field in a YAML metadata section. The bibliography
may have any of these formats:
Format |
File extension |
|
MODS |
.mods |
BibLaTeX |
.bib |
BibTeX |
.bibtex |
RIS |
.ris |
EndNote |
.enl |
EndNote XML |
.xml |
ISI |
.wos |
MEDLINE |
.medline |
Copac |
.copac |
JSON citeproc |
.json |
Note that .bib can generally be used with both BibTeX and BibLaTeX files, but
you can use .bibtex to force BibTeX.
Alternatively you can use a references field in the document's YAML metadata.
This should include an array of YAML-encoded references, for example:
-
---
references:
- id: fenner2012a
title: One-click science marketing
author:
- family: Fenner
given: Martin
container-title: Nature Materials
volume: 11
URL: 'http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nmat3283'
DOI: 10.1038/nmat3283
issue: 4
publisher: Nature Publishing Group
page: 261-263
type: article-journal
issued:
year: 2012
month: 3
...
(The program mods2yaml, which comes with pandoc-citeproc, can help produce these
from a MODS reference collection.)
By default, pandoc-citeproc will use a Chicago author-date format for citations
and references. To use another style, you will need to specify a CSL 1.0 style
file in the csl metadata field. A primer on creating and modifying CSL styles
can be found at
http://citationstyles.org/downloads/primer.html. A repository
of CSL styles can be found at
https://github.com/citation-style-language/styles. See also
http://zotero.org/styles for easy browsing.
Citations go inside square brackets and are separated by semicolons. Each
citation must have a key, composed of '@' + the citation identifier from the
database, and may optionally have a prefix, a locator, and a suffix. The
citation key must begin with a letter or _, and may contain alphanumerics, _,
and internal punctuation characters (:.#$%&-+?<>~/). Here are some
examples:
-
Blah blah [see @doe99, pp. 33-35; also @smith04, ch. 1].
Blah blah [@doe99, pp. 33-35, 38-39 and *passim*].
Blah blah [@smith04; @doe99].
A minus sign (-) before the @ will suppress mention of the author in the
citation. This can be useful when the author is already mentioned in the text:
-
Smith says blah [-@smith04].
You can also write an in-text citation, as follows:
-
@smith04 says blah.
@smith04 [p. 33] says blah.
If the style calls for a list of works cited, it will be placed at the end of
the document. Normally, you will want to end your document with an appropriate
header:
-
last paragraph...
# References
The bibliography will be inserted after this header. Note that the unnumbered
class will be added to this header, so that the section will not be numbered.
If you want to include items in the bibliography without actually citing them in
the body text, you can define a dummy nocite metadata field and put the
citations there:
-
---
nocite:
| @item1, @item2
...
@item3
In this example, the document will contain a citation for item3 only, but the
bibliography will contain entries for item1, item2, and item3.
NON-PANDOC EXTENSIONS¶
The following markdown syntax extensions are not enabled by default in pandoc,
but may be enabled by adding +EXTENSION to the format name, where EXTENSION is
the name of the extension. Thus, for example, markdown+hard_line_breaks is
markdown with hard line breaks.
Extension: lists_without_preceding_blankline
Allow a list to occur right after a paragraph, with no intervening blank space.
Extension: hard_line_breaks
Causes all newlines within a paragraph to be interpreted as hard line breaks
instead of spaces.
Extension: ignore_line_breaks
Causes newlines within a paragraph to be ignored, rather than being treated as
spaces or as hard line breaks. This option is intended for use with East Asian
languages where spaces are not used between words, but text is divided into
lines for readability.
Extension: tex_math_single_backslash
Causes anything between \( and \) to be interpreted as inline TeX math, and
anything between \[ and \] to be interpreted as display TeX math. Note: a
drawback of this extension is that it precludes escaping ( and [.
Extension: tex_math_double_backslash
Causes anything between \\( and \\) to be interpreted as inline TeX math, and
anything between \\[ and \\] to be interpreted as display TeX math.
Extension: markdown_attribute
By default, pandoc interprets material inside block-level tags as markdown. This
extension changes the behavior so that markdown is only parsed inside
block-level tags if the tags have the attribute markdown=1.
Extension: mmd_title_block
Enables a MultiMarkdown style title block at the top of the document, for
example:
-
Title: My title
Author: John Doe
Date: September 1, 2008
Comment: This is a sample mmd title block, with
a field spanning multiple lines.
See the MultiMarkdown documentation for details. If pandoc_title_block or
yaml_metadata_block is enabled, it will take precedence over mmd_title_block.
Extension: abbreviations
Parses PHP Markdown Extra abbreviation keys, like
-
*[HTML]: Hyper Text Markup Language
Note that the pandoc document model does not support abbreviations, so if this
extension is enabled, abbreviation keys are simply skipped (as opposed to
being parsed as paragraphs).
Extension: autolink_bare_uris
Makes all absolute URIs into links, even when not surrounded by pointy braces
<...>.
Extension: ascii_identifiers
Causes the identifiers produced by auto_identifiers to be pure ASCII. Accents
are stripped off of accented latin letters, and non-latin letters are omitted.
Extension: link_attributes
Parses multimarkdown style key-value attributes on link and image references.
Note that pandoc's internal document model provides nowhere to put these, so
they are presently just ignored.
Extension: mmd_header_identifiers
Parses multimarkdown style header identifiers (in square brackets, after the
header but before any trailing #s in an ATX header).
MARKDOWN VARIANTS¶
In addition to pandoc's extended markdown, the following markdown variants are
supported:
- markdown_phpextra (PHP Markdown Extra)
- footnotes, pipe_tables, raw_html, markdown_attribute, fenced_code_blocks,
definition_lists, intraword_underscores, header_attributes,
abbreviations.
- markdown_github (Github-flavored Markdown)
- pipe_tables, raw_html, tex_math_single_backslash, fenced_code_blocks,
fenced_code_attributes, auto_identifiers, ascii_identifiers,
backtick_code_blocks, autolink_bare_uris, intraword_underscores,
strikeout, hard_line_breaks
- markdown_mmd (MultiMarkdown)
- pipe_tables raw_html, markdown_attribute, link_attributes, raw_tex,
tex_math_double_backslash, intraword_underscores, mmd_title_block,
footnotes, definition_lists, all_symbols_escapable,
implicit_header_references, auto_identifiers, mmd_header_identifiers
- markdown_strict (Markdown.pl)
- raw_html
Some of the extensions discussed above can be used with formats other than
markdown:
- •
- auto_identifiers can be used with latex, rst, mediawiki, and textile input
(and is used by default).
- •
- tex_math_dollars, tex_math_single_backslash, and tex_math_double_backslash
can be used with html input. (This is handy for reading web pages
formatted using MathJax, for example.)
NOTES¶
[1]¶
The point of this rule is to ensure that normal paragraphs starting with
people's initials, like
-
B. Russell was an English philosopher.
do not get treated as list items.
This rule will not prevent
-
(C) 2007 Joe Smith
from being interpreted as a list item. In this case, a backslash escape can be
used:
-
(C\) 2007 Joe Smith
[2]¶
I have also been influenced by the suggestions of David Wheeler.
[3]¶
This scheme is due to Michel Fortin, who proposed it on the Markdown discussion
list.
[4]¶
This feature is not yet implemented for RTF, OpenDocument, or ODT. In those
formats, you'll just get an image in a paragraph by itself, with no caption.
SEE ALSO¶
pandoc (1).