[[!template id=plugin name=mdwn core=1 author="[[Joey]]"]]
[[!tag type/format]]

This plugin lets ikwiki convert files with names ending in ".mdwn" to html.
It uses the [[ikiwiki/markdown]] minimal markup language.

This is the standard markup language used by ikiwiki, although some others
are also available in other plugins.

## Implementations

There are several implementations of markdown support that can be used by
this plugin. In order of preference:

* [Discount](http://www.pell.portland.or.us/~orc/Code/discount/),
  via the [[!cpan Text::Markdown::Discount]] perl module.
  This implementation is considered to be the default and is strongly
  recommended, but it is not mandatory because it requires an external
  C library.
* The [[!cpan Text::Markdown]] perl module.
* The [original version of markdown](http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/).

[[!cpan Text::MultiMarkdown]] can be used in order to use tables, footnotes,
and other new features from the markdown variant called
[multimarkdown](http://fletcherpenney.net/MultiMarkdown/) (some of which
are also available in the recommended implementation, Discount). Multimarkdown is
not enabled by default, but can be turned on via the `multimarkdown` option
in the setup file. Note that multimarkdown's metadata and wikilinks
features are disabled when it's used with ikiwiki. Also note that if the
`multimarkdown` option is enabled, it takes priority over Discount, which
might cause formatting that is understood by Discount to be ignored.


## Advanced options

* `nodiscount`: If set to 1, Text::Markdown::Discount will not be used
  even if it is available. The default is to use Discount if available,
  and this is recommended.
* `multimarkdown`: If set to 1, Text::MultiMarkdown will be used in
  preference to Text::Markdown::Discount. The default is to not use
  MultiMarkdown, and this is recommended.
* `mdwn_footnotes`: If set to 1, implementations that support it will
  recognise the footnote syntax originating in PHP Markdown Extra, with
  `Footnote reference[^1]` and `[^1]: Footnote definition`. The default
  is 1.
* `mdwn_alpha_lists`: If set to 1, Text::Markdown::Discount will
  accept letters as well as numbers in ordered list markers. The
  default is 0, to avoid unintended parsing of lines that happen
  to begin with a letter and a dot, such as "C. S. Lewis was an
  author" or "M. Descartes was a philosopher".