Lightweight markup language - Wikipedia

Level 2 Heading
---------------

Level 3 Heading
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The first style uses underlines, i.e., repeated characters (e.g., equals
, hyphen
or tilde
, usually at least two or four times) in the line below the heading text.
Underlined heading levels
Character
Language
Min. length
AsciiDoc
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Markdown
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
reStructuredText
Heading structure is determined dynamically from the succession of headings
heading width
Setext
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Texy!
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Headings may optionally be overline in
reStructuredText
, in addition to being underlined.
Prefixed headings
edit
# Level 1 Heading
## Level 2 Heading ##
### Level 3 Heading ###
The second style is based on repeated markers (e.g., hash
, equals
or asterisk
) at the start of the heading itself, where the number of repetitions indicates the (sometimes inverse) heading level. Most languages also support the reduplication of the markers at the end of the line, but whereas some make them mandatory, others do not even expect their numbers to match.
Line prefix (and suffix) headings
Character
Language
Suffix
Levels
Indentation
AsciiDoc
Yes
No
No
No
No
Optional
1–6
No
Creole
Yes
No
No
No
No
Optional
1–6
No
DokuWiki
Yes
No
No
No
No
Yes
6-1
No
Gemtext
No
Yes
No
No
No
1–3
No
Markdown
No
Yes
No
No
No
Optional
1–6
No
MediaWiki
Yes
No
No
No
No
Yes
1–6
No
Org-mode
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
1– +∞
alternative
51
52
53
PmWiki
No
No
No
Yes
No
Optional
1–6
No
Texy!
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Optional
6–1, dynamic
No
TiddlyWiki
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
1–6
No
txt2tags
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
1–6
No
Org-mode supports indentation as a means of indicating the level.
BBCode
does not support section headings at all.
POD and Textile choose the HTML convention of numbered heading levels instead.
Other heading formats
Language
Format
POD
=head1 Level 1 Heading
=head2 Level 2 Heading
Jira
Textile
49
h1. Level 1 Heading
h2. Level 2 Heading
h3. Level 3 Heading
h4. Level 4 Heading
h5. Level 5 Heading
h6. Level 6 Heading
Microsoft Word supports auto-formatting paragraphs as headings if they do not contain more than a handful of words, no period at the end and the user hits the enter key twice. For lower levels, the user may press the tabulator key the according number of times before entering the text, i.e., one through eight tabs for heading levels two through nine.
Link syntax
edit
Hyperlinks can either be added inline, which may clutter the code because of long URLs, or with named
alias
or numbered
id
references to lines containing nothing but the address and related attributes and often may be located anywhere in the document.
Most languages allow the author to specify text
Text
to be displayed instead of the plain address
and some also provide methods to set a different link title
Title
which may contain more information about the destination.
LMLs that are tailored for special setups, e.g., wikis or code documentation, may automatically generate named anchors (for headings, functions etc.) inside the document, link to related pages (possibly in a different namespace) or provide a textual search for linked keywords.
Most languages employ (double) square or angular brackets to surround links, but hardly any two languages are completely compatible. Many can automatically recognize and parse absolute URLs inside the text without further markup.
Hyperlink syntax
Languages
Basic syntax
Text syntax
Title syntax
AsciiDoc
BBCode, Creole, MediaWiki, PmWiki
Slack

Textile
"Text":http://example.com
"Text (Title)":http://example.com
Texy!
"Text .(Title)":http://example.com
Jira
[http://example.com]
[Text|http://example.com]
MediaWiki
[http://example.com Text]
txt2tags
[Text http://example.com]
Creole, MediaWiki, PmWiki, DokuWiki
[[Name]]
[[Name|Text]]
Org-mode
[[Name][Text]]
TiddlyWiki
[[Text|Name]]
Creole
[[Namespace:Name]]
[[Namespace:Name|Text]]
Org-mode
[[Namespace:Name][Text]]
Creole, PmWiki
[[http://example.com]]
[[http://example.com|Text]]
BBCode
[url]http://example.com[/url]
[url=http://example.com]Text[/url]
Markdown

[Text](http://example.com)
[Text](http://example.com "Title")
reStructuredText
`Text `_
Gemtext
=> gemini://example.com
=> gemini://example.com Text
POD
L
L
setext
^.. _Link_name URL
Gemtext and setext links must be on a line by themselves, they cannot be used inline.
Reference syntax
Languages
Text syntax
Title syntax
AsciiDoc
… [[id]] …
<>
… [[id]] …
<>
… anchor:id …
xref:id
… anchor:id …
xref:id[Text]
Markdown
… [
Text
][
id
] …
id
]:
… [
Text
][
id
] …
id
]:
… [
Text
][] …
Text
]:
… [
Text
][] …
Text
]:
… [Text] …
Text
]:
… [Text] …
Text
]:
reStructuredText
… Name_ …
..
_Name:
setext
… Link_name_ …
^.. _Link_name URL
Textile
… "Text":alias …
[alias]http://example.com
… "Text":alias …
[alias (Title)]http://example.com
Texy!
… "Text":alias …
[alias]: http://example.com
… "Text":alias …
[alias]: http://example.com .(Title)
Org-mode's normal link syntax does a text search of the file. You can also put in dedicated targets with
<>
Media and external resource syntax
edit
This section
needs expansion
with: comparison table featuring how languages handle embedded images, audio, video and other types of media (e.g., social media links). You can help by
adding missing information
June 2014
List syntax
edit
HTML requires an explicit element for the list, specifying its type, and one for each list item, but most lightweight markup languages need only different line prefixes for the bullet points or enumerated items. Some languages rely on indentation for nested lists, others use repeated parent list markers.
Unordered, bullet list items
Character
Language
indent
skip
nest
AsciiDoc
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
repeat
or
alternate the marker
DokuWiki
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
2+
0+
indent
Gemtext
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
1+
N/a
Jira
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
1+
repeat
Markdown
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
0–3
1–3
indent
MediaWiki
TiddlyWiki
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
1+
repeat
Org-mode
Yes
54
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
0+
indent
Textile
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
1+
repeat
Texy!
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
2+
indent
Microsoft Word automatically converts paragraphs that start with an asterisk
, hyphen-minus
or greater-than bracket
followed by a space or horizontal tabulator as bullet list items. It will also start an enumerated list for the digit
and the case-insensitive letters
(for alphabetic lists) or
(for roman numerals), if they are followed by a period
, a closing round parenthesis
, a greater-than sign
or a hyphen-minus
and a space or tab; in case of the round parenthesis an optional opening one
before the list marker is also supported.
Languages differ on whether they support optional or mandatory digits in numbered list items, which kinds of enumerators they understand (e.g., decimal digit
, roman numerals
or
, alphabetic letters
or
) and whether they support to keep explicit values in the output format. Some Markdown dialects, for instance, will respect a start value other than 1, but ignore any other explicit value.
Ordered, enumerated list items
Character
Language
#1
1.
1)
1]
1}
(1)
[1]
{1}
a.
A.
i.
I.
indent
skip
nest
AsciiDoc
No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
repeat
or
alternate the marker
DokuWiki
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
2+
0+
indent
Jira
MediaWiki
Textile
TiddlyWiki
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
1+
repeat
Markdown
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
0–3
1–3
indent
Org-mode
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
Optional
No
No
0+
indent
Texy!
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
Only with
delimiter
No
Only with
delimiter
2+
indent
Slack assists the user in entering enumerated and bullet lists, but does not actually format them as such, i.e., it just includes a leading digit followed by a period and a space or a bullet character
in front of a line.
Labeled, glossary,
description/definition list
syntax
Languages
Term being defined
Definition of the term
AsciiDoc
Term::
No specific requirements; may be mixed with ordered or unordered lists, with nesting optional
Term::::
Term;;
MediaWiki
; Term
: Definition
Textile
TiddlyWiki
Texy!
Term:
- Definition
Org-mode
- Term :: Definition
Quotation syntax
edit
This section
needs expansion
with: differentiation between in-line and block quotes, and any handling for attribution. You can help by
adding missing information
June 2014
Table syntax
edit
This section
needs expansion
with: Cell, Row, Column, Header, Caption. You can help by
adding missing information
June 2014
Historical formats
edit
The following lightweight markup languages, while similar to some of those already mentioned, have not yet been added to the comparison tables in this article:
EtText
55
circa 2000.
Grutatext
56
circa 2002.
See also
edit
Comparison of document-markup languages
Comparison of documentation generators
Lightweight programming language
Notes
edit
JTexy has full compatibility with
Texy!
1.0 syntax and some compatibility with 2.0+.
Deprecated in Asciidoctor 2.0; versions after this represent the current rendition of the language and are aligned to the standard which is still being produced as of April 2025. This syntax
remains available through a compatibility mode
Text spans
in AsciiDoc are termed
quoted text attributes
in legacy implementations.
Width of title ± 2 characters
Indenting by a single whitepace in AsciiDoc will preformat the text of that line.
The modern language specification only supports a full stop as a delimiter for any ordered list. In the legacy AsciiDoc.py syntax, only a right parenthesis was acceptable for either lower alpha or Roman numerals.
References
edit
"AsciiDoc ChangeLog"
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
"WikiCreole Versions"
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
"djot"
. Retrieved
2023-08-26
"djot 0.1.0"
GitHub
. Retrieved
2023-08-26
"DokuWiki old_changes"
. Retrieved
2024-11-26
Jira.
"Text Formatting Notation Help"
. Atlassian
. Retrieved
2020-12-22
"Markdown"
Aaron Swartz: The Weblog
. 2004-03-19.
"Daring Fireball: Markdown"
. Archived from
the original
on 2004-04-02
. Retrieved
2014-04-25
"PHP Markdown Extra"
. Michel Fortin
. Retrieved
2013-10-08
"PHP Markdown: History"
. Michel Fortin
. Retrieved
2020-12-23
"MediaWiki history"
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
Pandoc
Archived
2013-11-15 at the
Wayback Machine
, which is written in
Haskell
, parses Markdown (in two forms),
ReStructuredText
, HTML, and LaTeX; it writes from any of these formats to
HTML
RTF
LaTeX
ConTeXt
OpenDocument
EPUB
, PDF (via LaTeX), and several other formats.
"Org mode for Emacs – Your Life in Plain Text"
orgmode.org
. OrgMode team
. Retrieved
2016-12-09
"PmWiki Cookbook - Export addons"
. Retrieved
7 January
2018
"An Introduction to reStructuredText"
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
"TidBITS in new format"
TidBITS
. 1992-01-06
. Retrieved
2022-07-01
"Slack Help Center > Using Slack > Send messages > Format your messages"
. Retrieved
2018-08-07
"Slack API documentation: Basic message formatting"
. Retrieved
2018-08-07
"Textism › Tools › Textile"
textism.com
. Archived from
the original
on 26 December 2002.
"What is Texy"
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
"History of TiddlyWiki"
tiddlywiki.com
"Html2wiki txt2tags module"
MetaCPAN
. cpan.org
. Retrieved
2014-01-30
"Txt2tags User Guide"
. Txt2tags.org
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
"txt2tags changelog"
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
"WhatsApp FAQ: Formatting your messages"
. Retrieved
2017-11-21
"Txt2tags User Guide"
. Txt2tags.org
. Retrieved
2017-02-24
"DokuWiki Tips htmltowiki"
. Retrieved
2024-11-26
"DokuWiki FAQ html"
. Retrieved
2024-11-26
"Converters"
. WikiCreole
. Retrieved
2013-10-08
pegdown
: A Java library for Markdown processing
gfms
: Github Flavored Markdown Server
marked
: A full-featured markdown parser and compiler, written in JavaScript. Built for speed.
node-gfm
: GitHub flavored markdown to HTML converter
Parsedown
: Markdown parser written in PHP
Ciconia
: Markdown parser written in PHP
Grip
: GitHub Readme Instant Preview
github-markdown
: Self-contained Markdown parser for GitHub
peg-markdown
is an implementation of
markdown
in
Discount
is also an implementation of
markdown
in
"Python-Markdown"
. Github.com
. Retrieved
2013-10-08
Bruce Williams.
"kramdown: Project Info"
. RubyForge. Archived from
the original
on 2013-08-07
. Retrieved
2013-10-08
"Via ox-pandoc and pandoc itself"
GitHub
Atlassian.
"Confluence 4.0 Editor - What's Changed for Wiki Markup Users (Confluence Wiki Markup is dead)"
. Retrieved
2018-03-28
Docutils
is an implementation of
ReStructuredText
in
Python
Sphinx
is an implementation of
ReStructuredText
in
Python
and
Docutils
with a number of output format
Builders
Aurelio Jargas www.aurelio.net (2012-01-11).
"txt2tags"
. txt2tags
. Retrieved
2013-10-08
"txt2tags.class.php - online convertor [sic]"
. Txt2tags.org
. Retrieved
2013-10-08
"Markdown Syntax"
. Daringfireball.net
. Retrieved
2013-10-08
Textile Syntax
Archived
2010-08-12 at the
Wayback Machine
"atx, the true structured text format" by Aaron Swartz (2002)
"The Org Manual: section "A Cleaner Outline View"
. Retrieved
14 June
2020
"using org-adapt-indentation"
"using org-indent-mode or org-indent"
Footnote in official manual
"When using ‘*’ as a bullet, lines must be indented so that they are not interpreted as headlines. Also, when you are hiding leading stars to get a clean outline view, plain list items starting with a star may be hard to distinguish from true headlines. In short: even though ‘*’ is supported, it may be better to not use it for plain list items."
"EtText: Documentation: Using EtText"
ettext.taint.org
. Retrieved
2022-06-30
originally from the
WebMake
[1]
project.
"Un naufragio personal: The Grutatxt markup"
triptico.com
. Archived from
the original
on 2022-06-30
. Retrieved
2022-06-30
Public domain format (since version 2.20); originally used in the
Gruta
CMS
system.
External links
edit
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