Compare and contrast the lightweight markup languages (Textile, Markdown, and reStructuredText)

Posted by jhs on Stack Overflow See other posts from Stack Overflow or by jhs
Published on 2009-03-18T17:10:40Z Indexed on 2010/06/08 13:22 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 344

Filed under:

documentation

|

markdown

|

markup

|

restructuredtext

|

textile

Please identify the most popular lightweight markup languages and compare their strengths and weaknesses. These languages should be general-purpose markup for technical prose, such as for documentation (for example, Haml doesn't count).

See also: Markdown versus ReStructuredText

© Stack Overflow or respective owner

Related posts about documentation

Hyperlinked, externalized source code documentation

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
Why do we still embed natural language descriptions of source code (i.e., the reason why a line of code was written) within the source code, rather than as a separate document? Given the expansive real-estate afforded to modern development environments (high-resolution monitors, dual-monitors, etc… >>> More
A tool to aid completion of missing or incomplete source code documentation

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I have several finished, older PHP projects with a lot of includes that I would like to document in javadoc/phpDocumentor style. While working through each file manually and being forced to do a code review alongside the documenting would be the best thing, I am, simply out of time constraints,… >>> More
Quick C# Project Documentation in Visual Studio

as seen on Internet.com - Search for 'Internet.com'
Here's a quick way to document your .NET projects. >>> More
SQLAuthority News – Feature Pack for Microsoft SQL Server 2005 SP4

as seen on SQL Authority - Search for 'SQL Authority'
If you are still using SQL Server 2005 – I suggest that you consider migrating to later version of the SQL Server 2008/2008 R2. Due to any reason, you wanted to continue using SQL Server 2005, I suggest that you take a look at the Feature Pack for Microsoft SQL Server 2005 SP4. There are many… >>> More
SQLAuthority News – Statistics Used by the Query Optimizer in Microsoft SQL Server 2008 – Microsoft Whitepaper

as seen on SQL Authority - Search for 'SQL Authority'
I recently presented session on Statistics and Best Practices in Virtual Tech Days on Nov 22, 2010. The sessions was very popular and I got many questions right after the sessions. The number question I had received was where everybody can get the further information. I am very much happy that my… >>> More

Related posts about markdown

WMD markdown editor - HTML to Markdown conversion

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I am using wmd markdown editor on a project and had a question: When I post the form containing the markdown text area, it (as expected) posts html to the server. However, say upon server-side validation something fails and I need to send the user back to edit their entry, is there anyway to refill… >>> More
Javascript to convert Markdown/Textile to HTML (and, ideally, back to Markdown/Textile)

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
There are several good Javascript editors for Markdown / Textile (e.g.: http://attacklab.net/showdown/, the one I'm using right now), but all I need is a Javascript function that converts a string from Markdown / Textile - HTML and back. What's the best way to do this? (Ideally it would be jQuery-friendly… >>> More
i18n / Markdown - Does Markdown support internationalization?

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I'm building a CMS which needs to manage content in english, chinese, and spanish at a minimum. Do most markdown implementations handle UTF-8 encoded text? Is the Markdown language designed to be used with non-english languages? I'm currently using Markdown Extra by Michel Fortin. >>> More
To install Markdown's extensions by Python

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
The installation notes (git://gitorious.org/python-markdown/mainline.git) say in the file using_as_module.txt One of the parameters that you can pass is a list of Extensions. Extensions must be available as python modules either within the markdown.extensions package or on… >>> More
Error in {% markdown %} filter in Django Nonrel

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I'm having trouble using Markdown in Django Nonrel. I followed this instructions (added 'django.contrib.markup' to INSTALLED_APPS, include {% load markup %} in the template and use |markdown filter after installing python-markdown) but I get the following error: Error in {% markdown %}… >>> More