SmartDown
Smarter Markdown.
SmartDown formats text using Markdown Extra and SmartyPants. You can specify it as the default text formatting for a custom field, or use it directly in your templates.
SmartDown is a single-plugin replacement for the MarkyPants, Markdown, and SmartyPants plugins.
What is Markdown Extra?
The original Markdown was created by Jon Gruber as a way to write basic HTML, using an easy-to-read, easy-to-write plain text format.
The target audience is web writers, and non-technical web authors (read: clients).
Markdown supports all the text formatting typically required when creating content: headings, paragraphs, links, bold, italics, lists, blockquotes, you get the idea.
The splendid Michel Forin wrote a PHP version of Markdown, and then proceeded to extend it. Markdown Extra is the result, and features even more spicy content goodness, including definition lists, tables, even footnotes.
I may need to lie down, the excitement is too much.
Full documentation of Markdown’s syntax is available on John Gruber’s Markdown page, and you can get the skinny on Markdown Extra at Michel Forin’s Markdown Extra page.
What is SmartyPants?
SmartyPants translates ASCII punctation characters into “smart” typographic HTML entities. SmartyPants performs the following transformations:
- Straight quotes (
'and") into “curly” quote HTML entities. - Dashes (
--and---) into en- and em-dash entities. - Three consecutive dots (
...) into an ellipsis entity.
SmartyPants formatting is applied after Markdown formatting. This means that SmartyPants won’t mess with your Markdown code blocks, or otherwise ruin your nicely-formatted content.
SmartyPants was once again created by the inimitable John Gruber, and PHPified by the strangely alluring Michel Forin.
Full SmartyPants documentation may be found at Mr. Gruber’s online residence.