Emphasis tokens

[Gyogyo]

Hi Evan,

can you make it possible that the user can define which symbols to use as emphasis tokens for bold and italic? You allow us to set the token for Unordered List Style in the Markdown Settings, and I'd like -just like that- to set my personal preference for bold (asterisks *) and italic (underscores _) in these Settings as well.

I know it is a real small efficiency request, but would be appreciated.

Gyogyó

[evanw]

Thanks for the post. I'll consider this, but the reason these tokens are not editable is because the Markdown specification, at least to my knowledge, only defines a specific subset of characters to identify emphasis and bold text (* and **, respectively). If tokens outside of the Markdown specification are used, the resulting HTML content will likely be rendered incorrectly.

[Gyogyo]

Hi Evan,

Of course you should not even consider syntax that is not defined as markdown, but the underscore is since long defined as a token to identify emphasis and bold text.

Some people made a habit of using double asterisks \*\* for bold and a single underscores \_ for italic and for me that convention really improves readability of the original text (I used to write all without preview of course). I'd like to stick to that and wondered if you can make MarkdownPad support that in its keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl+I). Please reconsider this.

All you're build-in flavors support this, of course.

Cheers, Gyogyó

I took this from daringfireball.net:

---

Emphasis

Markdown treats asterisks (\*) and underscores (\_) as indicators of emphasis. Text wrapped with one \* or \_ will be wrapped with an HTML tag; double \*’s or \_’s will be wrapped with an HTML tag. E.g., this input:

\*single asterisks\*

\_single underscores\_

\*\*double asterisks\*\*

\_\_double underscores\_\_

will produce:

single asterisks

single underscores

double asterisks

double underscores

---

[app103]

I just downloaded and installed MarkdownPad, and I must say that I am quite impressed with how polished it is.

But, I, too would like the ability to set underscores as the default for emphasis, as where I ultimately need to paste the markdown that is generated, does not support asterisks for emphasis, only underscores.

Without the ability to over-ride the default, I would need to manually add the underscores, instead of using the button on the toolbar, which kind of defeats the whole purpose of using MarkdownPad. If I am going to have to write my own markdown, I might as well just use a basic plain text editor, like Notepad.

Additionally, there are 2 other defaults I'd like to be able to over-ride:

• code
• preformatted text

I am not sure what other people are using Markdown Pad for, but I am using it as a speed tool, to be able to format my text with the necessary markdown, so I can then copy and paste it where I need to use it. Once I hit the submit button, I don't get the chance to fix it (there is no edit), so it needs to be done right the first time, before it gets submitted.

If the post editor where I need to paste it had a formatting toolbar and a preview panel (like this forum), I wouldn't have gone looking for a markdown editor.

I know what you said about the markdown specifications, but that really doesn't apply to or help any of us that have to use the resulting markdown in places that don't follow the specifications to the letter. If we can't over-ride the defaults with custom rules that match our specific use cases, then we ultimately end up with unusable markdown code that will result in HTML code that will absolutely be rendered incorrectly, which makes using MarkdownPad, pointless.