What is Markdown?

Markdown is a lightweight markup language that you can use to add formatting elements to plaintext text documents.

Using Markdown is different than using a WYSIWYG editor. In an application like Microsoft Word, you click buttons to format words and phrases, and the changes are visible immediately. Markdown isn’t like that. When you create a Markdown-formatted file, you add Markdown syntax to the text to indicate which words and phrases should look different.

It doesn’t take long to learn the Markdown syntax, and once you know how to use it, you can write using Markdown just about everywhere. Most people use Markdown to create content for the web, but Markdown is good for formatting everything from email messages to grocery lists.

How does Markdown work?

Markdown is a form of text file that usually uses the .md file format. It uses line-by-line formatting to display rich text. Every page of this very website is written in Markdown.

Some great CSArtisan articles that use frequent Markdown formatting are Interviewing the Endelman for its use of subheaders, and Art Therapy for its use of drop quotes.

Flavor

Every platform uses different tools to display Markdown. Editors that have distinct pairings of tools are described with different “flavors” of Markdown. Basically, they are like regional dialects. Here at the Artisan, we use “Jekyll Flavored” Markdown. You’ll learn what that means in a little bit, so don’t worry about it right now.

What can I edit Markdown with?

Editing Markdown can be done with any plain-old text editor, but an editor that is made specifically for Markdown will do you much better in the long-run. There are many options out there, so it can be overwhelming. Because of this, we have picked out the best editor for you to use for contributing, Dillinger!

Dillinger

Dillinger is a web-based, cloud-enabled platform for editing, previewing, and exporting Markdown. It can export into Dropbox, Google Drive, and even GitHub. Its ease of editing and previewing makes it the perfect tool for any beginner or expert.

The rest of this guide is made to guide you through using Dillinger.

Pros	Cons
Very easy to import/export	“Flavor” doesn’t match csartisan.org’s (see Flavor)
Web-based
No prior experience required

Continue to Dillinger