What is Markdown ?

Markdown is a lightweight markup language that is used to format plaintext files and convert them into proper HTML or XHTML documents. It was created by John Gruber and the legendary Aaron Swartz, with the goal of enabling people “to write using an easy-to-read and easy-to-write plain text format”.

You might know about Microsoft Word, which itself is a text formatting tool used to create documents. Unlike MS Word, Markdown doesn’t offer any fancy things like the B button or I , instead, what we have here is the quirky Markdown syntax.

How does it work ?

You don’t need to know a lot of nerdy stuff to understand the language, however, it’s better to know, how things are happening behind the scenes.

What’s happening is that our .md file is being converted into an HTML file, right ? But how ? Well, there’s a Markdown processor that processes or parse that .md file and finally outputs a properly formatted HTML document.

Markdown files have a file extension of .md. You might’ve come across readme file in a Github repository; Well, Yes! That’s the markdown file. Not just Github, markdown is also being used in:

* Static site generators.

* Websites like Bitbucket, Slack, Reddit, Discord, and many more.

* Writing Blog posts.

* Providing Documentation.

Markdown Cheat Sheet

Let’s take a closer look at the Markdown syntax and see for yourself, how easy and useful it is.

Italics

To italicize a piece of text, either use * or _

*This text* is italic => This text is italic.

_This text_ is italic => This text is italic.

Strong

Use either ** or __ to create bold text.

This text is **strong** => This text is strong.

This text is __strong__ => This text is strong.

Strikethrough

Use ~~ to create strikethrough text.

~~This text~~ is strikethrough => This text is strikethrough.

Blockquote

Use > to make your own blockquote.

This is a quote

Horizontal Rule

You could either use --- or ___ to create an hr.

Bullets

You need to use the * in order to create a bullet.

• This is a bullet point.

Links

[Google](http://www.google.com) => Google

[Google](http://www.google.com "Google Homepage") => Google

Images

Markdown even lets you embed images. Use an exclamation mark followed by the address of the image.

Here’s the fallout boy for you.

![Fallout Boy Image](https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-43080ade882169211fc1ea739644ea74)

Code Blocks

It’s one of the cool features of markdown. Many popular chatrooms or discussion forums like Slack, Discord and Reddit use this feature extensively.

function add(a, b) {
    return a + b;
}

Tables

Creating a table is a tedious task, even in HTML because you have to go through numerous td and tr kind of stuff. Don’t worry, Markdown has got your back!

| Name         | Email               |
| -------------| ------------------- |
|  Cartman     | e_cartman@gmail.com |
|  Kenny       | kenny12@gmail.com   |

You’ll get something like this:

Headings

Headings work the same way as we use tags like heading tags in HTML. But here, you just have to use a # sign to specify the heading type.

# Heading 1
## Heading 2
### Heading 3

Heading 1

Heading 2

Heading 3

Thanks for reading. And yes, this blog post has been written in Markdown, as well.