Learning Markdown

Markdown
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Markdown is a lightweight markup language with plain text formatting syntax designed so that it can be converted to HTML and many other formats using a tool by the same name. It is often used to format readme, for writing messages in online discussion forums, and to create rich text using a plain text editor.

So, here is a quick introduction to some of the elements of markdown.

  • Headers

Markdown provides 6 headers(H1-H6) similar to HTML.

To insert an H1 heading, you need to use a single #. For H2 use ## and so on till H6.

Eg: # This is a Header

  • Italics

If you want to write some content in italics, you can use * or _ (single hyphen).

Eg: This *word* is in italics or This _word _ is in italics.

  • Bold

To bold some content, you can use ** or __ (2 hyphens).

Eg: This **word** is in bold or This __word__ is in bold

  • Lists

To create an ordered list use two spaces and then the item number.

Eg: Here Spaces are determined using . (dot)

..1. Item1

..2. Item2 

To create an unordered list use two spaces and then *, – or +.

Eg: Here Spaces are determined using . (dot)

..* Item1

..* Item2

  • Links

To create a link, you can use the following syntax

1. [some text](link)

Eg:  [This is a link to google](https://www.google.com)

You can also provide title to a link.

Eg: [This is a link to google](http://www.google.com "Google")

2. You can also link to a header in the same file. Spaces in the heading are substituted by – (hyphen).

Eg: # Heading 1

To create a link to the above header :

[This is a link to Heading 1](#heading-1)

3. URLs in angular brackets acts as a link.

Eg:<http://www.google.com>

4. To create a reference style link:

[This is a link][reference]

[reference]: http://www.google.com

  • Images

Images can be used in two ways:

1. Inline style

![alt text](http://media02.hongkiat.com/ww-flower-wallpapers/roundflower.jpg "Image title")

2. Reference style

![alt text][img]

[img]: http://media02.hongkiat.com/ww-flower-wallpapers/roundflower.jpg "Image title"

  • Code Highlighting

For inline code-highlighting use ` (backtick).

Eg: This is `code`.

Block of code can be written using “` (three backticks) or indenting the code with four spaces.

Eg:

```
This is code
```
  • Tables

To create table in markdown, you can use | (pipes) and – (hyphens). Each column must be separated using — (3 hyphens)

Eg:

|Col 1|Col 2|
|—|—|
|data1|data2|

The outer pipes are optional.

  • Blockquotes

To add blockquotes, you can use >.

Eg: >This is a blockquote

  • Inline Html

You can also write raw Html in your markdown

Eg:

<dl><dt>Term</dt><dd>Description</dd></dl>

  •  Horizontal rule

You can use 3 or more * (astericks), – (hyphens) or _ (underscores ) to create an horizontal rule.

Eg: *** or ---

Here is the link for a sample markdown file:

Markdown File

IDE specifications:

You can use Intellij Idea to edit your md files. It provides the following plugins named:

Markdown Navigator and Markdown Support that helps to view styling of your md files.

Written by 

Geetika Gupta is a software consultant having more than 2.5 years of experience. She enjoys coding in languages such as C, C++, Java, Scala and also has a good knowledge of big data technologies like Spark, Hadoop, Hive and Presto and is currently working on Akka-HTTP and dynamoDB. Her hobbies include watching television, listening to music and travelling.