March 15, 2004

Markdown

Markdown is a text-to-HTML conversion tool for web writers. It converts content written in plain text format to valid XHTML.

... "Markdown" is two things: (1) a plain text formatting syntax; and (2) a software tool, written in Perl, that converts the plain text formatting to HTML. See the Syntax page for details pertaining to Markdown's formatting syntax. You can try it out, right now, using the online Dingus.

The overriding design goal for Markdown's formatting syntax is to make it as readable as possible. The idea is that 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.

Markdown works with Movable Type version 2.6 or later and Blosxom version 2.0 or later. It also works with BBEdit 6.1 or later on Mac OS X.

(Via webgraphics)