MARKDOWN, A Beginner's Guide!

MARKDOWN, A Beginner's Guide!

This blog would help you create your own readme file using markdown syntax in your GitHub Projects.

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6 min read

💢 Contents :



💢 What is Markdown?

Markdown is a plain text formatting syntax aimed at making writing for the internet easier. The philosophy behind Markdown is that plain text documents should be readable without tags messing up everything, but there should still be ways to add text modifiers like lists, bold, italics, etc.

  • To know more, click here

💢 All about README file :

A README file is an essential guide that gives other collaborators/developers a detailed description about your GitHub project.

🤔 Some folks must be wondering that why would I spend my time writing a README file? Well, it's not going to be waste of time and I'll give you some reasons for that📜

  • A good README enhances your project to stand out from other projects and it should definitely be as good as your project itself.

  • README file gets noticed first while checking out any project so it should be pretty brief, attractive and of course well explained.

Hence, these reasons clearly explains why you should have one effective and good-looking README file. That's one of the few things you can work on to increase your chances of grabbing other developer’s attention !


💢 Getting started with the elements of Markdown :

â—½ Headings :

# That's Heading 1
## That's Heading 2
### That's Heading 3
#### That's Heading 4
##### That's Heading 5
###### That's Heading 6
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â—½ Styling Texts :

StyleSyntaxExamples
Bold** ** OR __ __**That's a Bold Text** OR __That's a Bold Text__
Italic* * OR _ _*That's an Italicized Text* OR _That's an Italicized Text_
Bold and Italic*** *** OR ___ ___***That's Bold as well as Italicized Text*** OR ___That's Bold as well as Italicized Text___
Strikethrough~~ ~~~~That's a Wrong Text~~
Bold and nested Italic** _ _ ****That's Bold as well as _nested_ Italicized Text**
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â—½ Paragraphs :

Paragraphs are divided by a blank line between consecutive paragraphs.

This is the first paragraph

This is the second paragraph
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For creating links we need two set of brackets, [Content] for writing the text for the link and (URL) for mentioning the URL within parenthesis.

[Welcome to Hashnode !](https://hashnode.com/)
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â—½ Images :

To insert an image to your Markdown file, add an exclamation mark (!) in the beginning followed by square brackets to add the image alt text inside that and finally add the URL or path to the image inside the parentheses.

Note : Make sure to not leave any space between the exclamation mark, square brackets and parentheses !


![image](https://www.linkpicture.com/q/HN_Cover-pic_1.png)
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HN_Cover pic.png


â—½ Code Blocks :

To display any block of code, simply wrap the code block with Grave accent keys (`) thrice.

a = 10

print(5 < a < 15)
print(7 == a < 3)

Note : If you want to enable syntax highlighting in code blocks, just add the language name after the top triple grave accent keys.

  • Preview :

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â—½ Blockquotes :

To create blockquotes, add > in front of a paragraph.

> Learn markdown syntax to create beautiful readme files
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â—½ Nested Blockquotes :

Blockquotes can also be nested. Simply add >> in front of the paragraph that is to be nested.

> Learn markdown syntax to create beautiful readme files
>
>> Enhance projects with a good readme file to grab other developer’s attention
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â—½ Lists :

Items can be organized into ordered and unordered lists.

i) Ordered Lists :

To create an ordered list, add line items with numbers followed by periods.

1. Ordered List 1
2. Ordered List 2
3. Ordered List 3
1. Ordered List 1
2. Ordered List 2
    1. Indented item 1
    2. Indented item 2
3. Ordered List 3
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ii) Unordered Lists :

For creating Unordered list, add dashes (-), asterisks (*), or plus signs (+) in front of line items. Also Indentation of one or more items can create a nested list.

* Unordered List 1
* Unordered List 2
* Unordered List 3
- Unordered List 1
- Unordered List 2
    - Indented item 1
    - Indented item 2
- Unordered List 3
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â—½ Tables :

To create Tables, we can use three or more hyphens to create a header for each column (---), and separate those columns using pipes (|) and you can even use pipes on either ends of your table.


| Country    | Capital|
| ---------- | -------|
| Germany    | Berlin |
| Qatar      | Doha   |
| Cuba       | Havana |
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â—½ Horizontal Rule :

For creating a horizontal rule, we can use three or more asterisks , dashes or underscores on a line.


******

OR 

-----

OR

____________
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â—½ Task Lists :

Task lists allow us to create list of items with checkboxes. For creating tasks list, add dash (-) and a square bracket with a space ([ ]) in front of task list items. If we want to select a checkbox, simply add x in between the brackets ([x])

- [ ] Code to be reviewed

- [x]  Done with the tasks
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â—½ Escape Characters :

Some characters have special meanings in the Markdown syntax, so if you want to use these characters, you have to escape them by using a backslash character.

CharactersNames
\backslash
`backtick
*asterisk
_underscore
{ }curly braces
[ ]brackets
< >angular brackets
( )parentheses
#pound sign
+plus sign
-minus sign (hyphen)
.dot
!exclamation mark
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â—½ Line break :

For Line break, we can use a backslash after the end of the line and then we can move to the next line writing our texts.

Hello\
World
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â—½ End Note :

🎉Bravo ! You've made it. you've covered almost everything you need to know about markdown syntax, so what are you waiting for? Create a good Readme file, the next time you make a repository.

Let's Connect, Chayan Debbarma LinkedIn | GitHub

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