Learning Markdown

What is Markdown?

Markdown is a way to format the style of text on the web using simple non-alphabetic characters. HTML gives you control, however it slows down your authoring process. Markdown is a lightweight markup for generating HTML text.

How to use Markdown

This page is dedicated to explaining the numerous ways to use Markdown to format your web text. The following information is broken down into vocabulary definitions paired with examples of how to apply style to your text in a GitHub repository.

Repository

A repository, also known as a “repo,” is basically a bucket where you can place your code for the public.

Headers

To create a heading, you can start a line with #. The number of # you use will determine the size of the heading. You can include up to 6 tiers of headings to style your text.

# this is an <h1> heading

## this is an <h2> heading

Paragraphs

You can create new paragraphs by leaving a blank line between each new section.

Text Styling

Styling is important for when you need to create emphasis in your text.

Bold ** or __ __

Italic * or _ _

Strikethrough ~~

Bold and Nested Italics ** ** and _ _

All bold and Italics *** ***

Quotes

To quote text, use a >

Quoting Code

Use backticks to create distinct blocks around code examples. To format code or text into distinct blocks, use triple backticks. This creates a visual snapshot of the example.

Lists

There are numerous ways to create lists using Markdown. Lists can be divided into two categories: ordered and unordered, which each have several ways to create.

Ordered

To created an ordered list, simply start the line with a number.

Unordered

To create unordered lists, start the line with a -, + or a *

Images

To imbed images, use this method ![image name/alt text] (file location)

To create an inline link, wrap your text in brackets [ ] and wrap the url in parentheses ( )

Let’s Review

  1. Which character can be used to start each line in an unordered list?

  2. Which charachter can be used to start each line in an ordered list?

  3. What format can be used to create a hyperlink?

  4. What impact is rendered by using *webdev*

  5. What impact is rendered by using **webdev**

  6. What impact is rendered by using * webdev

  7. What impact is rendered by using > webdev

  8. What impact is rendered by using # webdev

Answers

  1. *, - or +
  2. 1.
  3. wrap text in brackets and the url in parentheses
  4. italics
  5. bold
  6. unordered list
  7. text quotes
  8. h1 header