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Anand Jha
Anand Jha

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Learn Basics of Markdown

What's Markdown and Why so popular ?

Markdown is one of the most popular mark-up language. It's lightweight markup language that you can use to add formatting elements to plain text documents. Markdown is popular because you can use it for everything like- to create Websites, documents, e-mail messages, presentation, books, technical documents.

Where to use ?

We can use Markdown everywhere it's fast and easy to take notes, create contents for website, from email messages to grocery list we can format using Markdown.

Let's learn Markdown

These are some elements all Markdown application support these elements.

Basic Markdown Syntax

Heading: We use # for headings
for H1 we use - #
for H2 we use - ##
and for H3 we use - ###

Heading

To format in bold we use - ** **

To format text in Italic we use - * *

Line Break : We use br for line break

For Ordered List we use: For ordered lists we use the numbering 1., 1., 1.. Wait — no consecutive numbers? No! Markdown takes care of the correct numbering automatically which is very useful if you want to add an additional element within your list at some later point. See the example below.

For Unordered List we use -: With Markdown it is very easy to create bulleted (unordered) and numbered (ordered) lists. For bulleted lists we use *, + or - for each bullet point.

For check-boxes we use: If you want to check a box just add x in the square brackets.

For Quotes: By using > Text a quote will be inserted. Blockquotes can be nested (i.e., a blockquote-in-a-blockquote) by adding additional levels of >:

For Link we use : In [] we write title and in () we write the link url

Reference-style: Instead of providing the link in parenthesis you give a reference name in square brackets and the link later on in the text or in a reference

To add a clickable email address in your text just put angle brackets around the email address: <>.

For Image we use : ![]()

Example of an inline-style image:

Top comments (3)

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robole profile image
Rob OLeary

One thing to note is that strikethrough and checkboxes are part of extended markdown syntax, they are not supported everywhere. You can see the basic syntax here: daringfireball.net/projects/markdo... . And also text contained within underscores is considered text with emphasis in the basic syntax

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tandy22 profile image
Tandy22

Hey, how do you make those tags at the beginning of your article be in colors ?
I cant see any markdown options for that :)

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fairushinfadis profile image
Fairushin Fadis

Thank you, even though I have my notes, but your article is very short and clear, added to favorites!