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================
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Markdown: Basics
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================
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* _[Markdown Basics]( "Markdown Basics")_
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* [Syntax]
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* [License]
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- - - - -
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------------------------------------------------
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Getting the Gist of Markdown's Formatting Syntax
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------------------------------------------------
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This page offers a brief overview of what it's like to use Markdown.
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The [syntax page] [s] provides complete, detailed documentation for
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every feature, but Markdown should be very easy to pick up simply by
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looking at a few examples of it in action. The examples on this page
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are written in a before/after style, showing example syntax and the
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HTML output produced by Markdown.
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It's also helpful to simply try Markdown out; the [Dingus] [d] is a
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web application that allows you type your own Markdown-formatted text
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and translate it to XHTML.
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**Note:** This document is itself written using Markdown; you
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can [see the source for it by adding `.md` to the URL] [src].
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[syntax]: syntax.html "Markdown Syntax"
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[license]: license.html "License Information"
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[src]: basics.md
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--------------------------------
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Paragraphs, Headers, Blockquotes
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--------------------------------
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A paragraph is simply one or more consecutive lines of text, separated
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by one or more blank lines. (A blank line is any line that looks like
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a blank line -- a line containing nothing but spaces or tabs is
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considered blank.) Normal paragraphs should not be indented with
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spaces or tabs. Note that Markdown expands all tabs to spaces before
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doing anything else.
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Markdown offers two styles of headers: *Setext* and *atx*.
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Setext-style headers for `<h1>`, `<h2>` and `<h3>` are created by
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"underlining" with equal signs (`=`), hyphens (`-`) and tildes (`~`)
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respectively. An optional matching "overline" may precede the header.
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To create an atx-style header, you put 1-6 hash marks (`#`) at the
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beginning of the line -- the number of hashes equals the resulting
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HTML header level.
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Blockquotes are indicated using email-style '`>`' angle brackets.
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Markdown:
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====================
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A First Level Header
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====================
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A Second Level Header
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---------------------
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A Third Level Header
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Now is the time for all good men to come to
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the aid of their country. This is just a
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regular paragraph.
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The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy
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dog's back.
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### Header 4
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> This is a blockquote.
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>
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> This is the second paragraph in the blockquote.
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>
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> ## This is an H2 in a blockquote
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Output:
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<h1>A First Level Header</h1>
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<h2>A Second Level Header</h2>
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<h3>A Third Level Header</h3>
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<p>Now is the time for all good men to come to
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the aid of their country. This is just a
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regular paragraph.</p>
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<p>The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy
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dog's back.</p>
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<h4>Header 3</h4>
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<blockquote>
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<p>This is a blockquote.</p>
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<p>This is the second paragraph in the blockquote.</p>
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<h2>This is an H2 in a blockquote</h2>
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</blockquote>
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Phrase Emphasis
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Markdown uses asterisks and underscores to indicate spans of emphasis.
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Markdown:
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Some of these words *are emphasized*.
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Some of these words _are emphasized also_.
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Use two asterisks for **strong emphasis**.
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Or, if you prefer, __use two underscores instead__.
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Or, even, ~~strike through instead~~.
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Output:
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<p>Some of these words <em>are emphasized</em>.
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Some of these words <em>are emphasized also</em>.</p>
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<p>Use two asterisks for <strong>strong emphasis</strong>.
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Or, if you prefer, <strong>use two underscores instead</strong>.
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Or, even, <strke>strike through instead</strike>.</p>
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-----
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Lists
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-----
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Unordered (bulleted) lists use asterisks, pluses, and hyphens (`*`,
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`+`, and `-`) as list markers. These three markers are
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interchangable; this:
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* Candy.
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* Gum.
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* Booze.
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this:
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+ Candy.
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+ Gum.
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+ Booze.
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and this:
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- Candy.
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- Gum.
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- Booze.
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all produce the same output:
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<ul>
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<li>Candy.</li>
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<li>Gum.</li>
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<li>Booze.</li>
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</ul>
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Ordered (numbered or lettered) lists use regular numbers (or letters or
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roman numerals), followed by periods (or right parentheses), as list
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markers:
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1. Red
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2. Green
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3. Blue
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Output:
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<ol>
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<li>Red</li>
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<li>Green</li>
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<li>Blue</li>
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</ol>
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If you put blank lines between items, you'll get `<p>` tags for the
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list item text. You can create multi-paragraph list items by indenting
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the paragraphs by 4 spaces:
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* A list item.
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With multiple paragraphs.
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* Another item in the list.
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Output:
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<ul>
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<li><p>A list item.</p>
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<p>With multiple paragraphs.</p></li>
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<li><p>Another item in the list.</p></li>
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</ul>
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~~~~~~
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Tables
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~~~~~~
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Markdown supports simple tables like so:
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| Item | Price | Description |
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| ---- | -----:| ----------- |
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| Nut | $1.29 | Delicious |
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| Bean | $0.37 | Fiber |
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Output:
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<table>
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<tr><th>Item</th><th align="right">Price</th><th>Description</th></tr>
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<tr><td>Nut</td><td align="right">$1.29</td><td>Delicious</td></tr>
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<tr><td>Bean</td><td align="right">$0.37</td><td>Fiber</td></tr>
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</table>
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~~~~~
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Links
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~~~~~
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Markdown supports two styles for creating links: *inline* and
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*reference*. With both styles, you use square brackets to delimit the
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text you want to turn into a link.
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Inline-style links use parentheses immediately after the link text.
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For example:
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This is an [example link](http://example.com/).
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Output:
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<p>This is an <a href="http://example.com/">
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example link</a>.</p>
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Optionally, you may include a title attribute in the parentheses:
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This is an [example link](http://example.com/ "With a Title").
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Output:
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<p>This is an <a href="http://example.com/" title="With a Title">
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example link</a>.</p>
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Reference-style links allow you to refer to your links by names, which
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you define elsewhere in your document:
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I get 10 times more traffic from [Google][1] than from
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[Yahoo][2] or [MSN][3].
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[1]: https://google.com/ "Google"
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[2]: https://search.yahoo.com/ "Yahoo Search"
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[3]: https://search.msn.com/ "MSN Search"
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Output:
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<p>I get 10 times more traffic from <a href="https://google.com/"
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title="Google">Google</a> than from <a href="https://search.yahoo.com/"
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title="Yahoo Search">Yahoo</a> or <a href="https://search.msn.com/"
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title="MSN Search">MSN</a>.</p>
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The title attribute is optional. Link names may contain letters,
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numbers and spaces, but are *not* case sensitive:
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I start my morning with a cup of coffee and
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[The New York Times][NY Times].
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[ny times]: https://www.nytimes.com/
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Output:
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<p>I start my morning with a cup of coffee and
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<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/">The New York Times</a>.</p>
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~~~~~~
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Images
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~~~~~~
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Image syntax is very much like link syntax.
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Inline (titles are optional):
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![alt text](/path/to/img.jpg "Title")
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Reference-style:
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![alt text][id]
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[id]: /path/to/img.jpg "Title"
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Both of the above examples produce the same output:
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<img src="/path/to/img.jpg" alt="alt text" title="Title" />
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~~~~
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Code
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~~~~
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In a regular paragraph, you can create code span by wrapping text in
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backtick quotes. Any ampersands (`&`) and angle brackets (`<` or
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`>`) will automatically be translated into HTML entities. This makes
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it easy to use Markdown to write about HTML example code:
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I strongly recommend against using any `<blink>` tags.
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I wish SmartyPants used named entities like `—`
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instead of decimal-encoded entites like `—`.
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Output:
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<p>I strongly recommend against using any
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<code><blink></code> tags.</p>
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<p>I wish SmartyPants used named entities like
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<code>&mdash;</code> instead of decimal-encoded
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entites like <code>&#8212;</code>.</p>
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To specify an entire block of pre-formatted code, indent every line of
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the block by 4 spaces. Just like with code spans, `&`, `<`, and `>`
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characters will be escaped automatically.
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Alternatively an entire block of pre-formatted code may be preceded with a
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line consisting of 3 backtick quotes (or more) and followed by a line
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consisting of the same number of backtick quotes -- in which case the code
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itself does not need to be additionally indented. The first line may
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optionally have a syntax specifier (e.g. sh, c, perl, etc.) appended.
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Note also that any physical tab characters within a 3-backtick-quotes,
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non-indented code block are *always* expanded correctly to 8-character
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tab-stop positions. This is to facilitate simple copy-and-paste to include
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code snippets.
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Markdown:
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```
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# This is a simple code block with unspecified syntax
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```
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Output:
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<pre><code># This is a simple code block with unspecified syntax
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</code></pre>
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Markdown:
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``` perl
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my $var = "value"; # this should be highlighted as Perl code
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```
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Output:
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<pre><code>my $var = "value"; # this should be highlighted as Perl code
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</code></pre>
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Markdown:
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If you want your page to validate under XHTML 1.0 Strict,
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you've got to put paragraph tags in your blockquotes:
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<blockquote>
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<p>For example.</p>
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</blockquote>
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Output:
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<p>If you want your page to validate under XHTML 1.0 Strict,
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you've got to put paragraph tags in your blockquotes:</p>
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<pre><code><blockquote>
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<p>For example.</p>
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</blockquote>
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</code></pre>
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