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You can include arbitrary HTML tags in Markdown at any place you need them.[0] I am not aware of any Markdown tooling that does not support this. So, no, Markd

You can include arbitrary HTML tags in Markdown at any place you need them.[0] I am not aware of any Markdown tooling that does not support this. So, no, Markdown is not holding me back. It is perfectly capable of what the author claims it isn't. [0]: https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/syntax#html https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/syntax#html

henrebotha 10mo ago
There are real limitations to this: You can't arbitrarily mix and match HTML and Markdown. As soon as you introduce an HTML block, you're locked out of Markdown syntax. AsciiDoc lets you mix and match however you want. Or, put differently: AsciiDoc's superiority over Markdown extends even to being better at shelling out to HTML.
- tefkah 10mo ago
  mdx does tho. you could just not define any components, then you can nest markdown inside html no problem
- vidarh 10mo ago
  While that's true, I'd take Markdown + extensions to allow inline HTML or custom tags over AsciiDoc any day, even at the cost of losing some compatibility - converting that to plain Markdown is usually easy enough.
  - judahmeek 10mo ago
    What are the trade-offs with AsciiDoc that would make you choose Markdown instead?
    - catlifeonmars 10mo ago
      Not op, but markdown is much more likely to render well in different contexts, without post processing. My editor understands markdown, GitHub understands markdown, the link preview renderer in <random collaborative tool> understands markdown. It’s the lowest common denominator
      - henrebotha 10mo ago
        That's true, and it's why we're all using it. But those different renderers all support different ill-defined interpretations of Markdown. You can forget about all of them accepting raw HTML.
    - vidarh 10mo ago
      It has sufficient differences to what is already accepted "everywhere" that I would have think about syntax more often than I'd like. That is enough. The minor inconveniences of Markdown incompatibilities are smaller than the inconveniece of AsciiDoc. It simply doesn't offer nearly enough potential advantages to be worth the hassle.
- youngtaff 10mo ago
  O’Reilly’s authoring system used to use AsciiDoc (may still do), made me hate AsciiDoc
throwaway150 10mo ago
> You can include arbitrary HTML tags in Markdown at any place you need them. That is well known and I am sure the author is aware of it. The problem they are describing is not whether HTML is technically allowed inside Markdown. It's that when you are writing Markdown, you are writing Markdown, not HTML, and that comes with some problems. > It is perfectly capable of what the author claims it isn't. In theory, yes. In practice, using Markdown becomes much less appealing once you start dropping raw HTML all over the place. The whole point of choosing Markdown is that you do not want to spend your time typing <p>, <a>, <li> and the rest. You want to write in Markdown, with only occasional HTML when absolutely necessary. That is exactly where the author's complaints become relevant. If the solution to Markdown's limitations is routinely switching to HTML, then the argument becomes circular. If you are expected to write HTML to address the author's complaints, why bother with Markdown at all? If the answer is just "write HTML", then you may as well skip Markdown in the first place.
- vorpalhex 10mo ago
  Most markdown engines allow short tags to stand in for html, so for frequent features you can just use a short tag. Alternatively you can extend markdown. I wrote a simple text based game engine that was markdown based but I needed some arbitrary additions appropriate for a game.. so I just added a few elements.
  - hysan 10mo ago
    The author addresses this too. Once you start down this path, you go down the road of non-standardization which means losing portability, etc. I don’t see how this is a point against the author?
    - bccdee 10mo ago
      None of the author's other suggestions are portable either. So what if pandoc markdown is only understood by pandoc's tooling? DocBook is only understood by DocBook tooling. The difference is that pandoc markdown is already 95% similar to every other flavour of markdown, so migrating to a new system (if necessary) would be relatively simple. Also, the difference is that XML is a pain to write and I'm not sure semantic tags matter all that much.
hizanberg 10mo ago
I also put interactive components in my markdown docs, I’m only using Markdown for content now.
littlestymaar 10mo ago
> I am not aware of any Markdown tooling that does not support this. Reddit surely doesn't, and I'd be very surprised if github did. In practice, in any place you want untrusted users writing markdown stuff for formatting, you cannot allow arbitrary HTML for security reasons.
- gen2brain 10mo ago
  I often use <img> with "width" on GitHub, so that I do not have the scrollbars on the main page, and one can click on the image to see the original size. It is ugly, but what is the alternative in Markdown? Several images instead of one?
- deleted 10mo ago
  [deleted]
- thayne 10mo ago
  Github has a very limited subset of html that is allowed. Slack doesn't allow html (although it also doesn't allow all markdown). If you are converting to something other than html, such as a manpage, using html tags generally doesn't work.
- immibis 10mo ago
  Why's anyone still using Reddit? I heard they just locked down their API again, to verified developers now.
  - littlestymaar 10mo ago
    Network effect, the same reason why the magnificent seven are worth more than a trillion dollar each.
a3w 10mo ago
I also used pandoc and markdown, and never bothered going back to ascidoc, full HTML, or latex. Footnotes are the only not always included extension to mmarkdown I need for slides or argument flows that are not killed by sidenotes, and some sites and toolings support that in markdown. Even table of contents is not a problem, so what else is left? Formula setting? Buttons for UI vs function? Buttons plus Inline JS for step by step state modification? I am not programming, I want text and something to be easily pasted into Word-like rich text, which seems to be the default text editor for emails for 90% of the population.

henrebotha 10mo ago

There are real limitations to this: You can't arbitrarily mix and match HTML and Markdown. As soon as you introduce an HTML block, you're locked out of Markdown syntax. AsciiDoc lets you mix and match however you want. Or, put differently: AsciiDoc's superiority over Markdown extends even to being better at shelling out to HTML.

tefkah 10mo ago
mdx does tho. you could just not define any components, then you can nest markdown inside html no problem
vidarh 10mo ago
While that's true, I'd take Markdown + extensions to allow inline HTML or custom tags over AsciiDoc any day, even at the cost of losing some compatibility - converting that to plain Markdown is usually easy enough.
- judahmeek 10mo ago
  What are the trade-offs with AsciiDoc that would make you choose Markdown instead?
  - catlifeonmars 10mo ago
    Not op, but markdown is much more likely to render well in different contexts, without post processing. My editor understands markdown, GitHub understands markdown, the link preview renderer in <random collaborative tool> understands markdown. It’s the lowest common denominator
    - henrebotha 10mo ago
      That's true, and it's why we're all using it. But those different renderers all support different ill-defined interpretations of Markdown. You can forget about all of them accepting raw HTML.
  - vidarh 10mo ago
    It has sufficient differences to what is already accepted "everywhere" that I would have think about syntax more often than I'd like. That is enough. The minor inconveniences of Markdown incompatibilities are smaller than the inconveniece of AsciiDoc. It simply doesn't offer nearly enough potential advantages to be worth the hassle.
youngtaff 10mo ago
O’Reilly’s authoring system used to use AsciiDoc (may still do), made me hate AsciiDoc

throwaway150 10mo ago

> You can include arbitrary HTML tags in Markdown at any place you need them. That is well known and I am sure the author is aware of it. The problem they are describing is not whether HTML is technically allowed inside Markdown. It's that when you are writing Markdown, you are writing Markdown, not HTML, and that comes with some problems. > It is perfectly capable of what the author claims it isn't. In theory, yes. In practice, using Markdown becomes much less appealing once you start dropping raw HTML all over the place. The whole point of choosing Markdown is that you do not want to spend your time typing <p>, <a>, <li> and the rest. You want to write in Markdown, with only occasional HTML when absolutely necessary. That is exactly where the author's complaints become relevant. If the solution to Markdown's limitations is routinely switching to HTML, then the argument becomes circular. If you are expected to write HTML to address the author's complaints, why bother with Markdown at all? If the answer is just "write HTML", then you may as well skip Markdown in the first place.

vorpalhex 10mo ago
Most markdown engines allow short tags to stand in for html, so for frequent features you can just use a short tag. Alternatively you can extend markdown. I wrote a simple text based game engine that was markdown based but I needed some arbitrary additions appropriate for a game.. so I just added a few elements.
- hysan 10mo ago
  The author addresses this too. Once you start down this path, you go down the road of non-standardization which means losing portability, etc. I don’t see how this is a point against the author?
  - bccdee 10mo ago
    None of the author's other suggestions are portable either. So what if pandoc markdown is only understood by pandoc's tooling? DocBook is only understood by DocBook tooling. The difference is that pandoc markdown is already 95% similar to every other flavour of markdown, so migrating to a new system (if necessary) would be relatively simple. Also, the difference is that XML is a pain to write and I'm not sure semantic tags matter all that much.

hizanberg 10mo ago

I also put interactive components in my markdown docs, I’m only using Markdown for content now.

littlestymaar 10mo ago

> I am not aware of any Markdown tooling that does not support this. Reddit surely doesn't, and I'd be very surprised if github did. In practice, in any place you want untrusted users writing markdown stuff for formatting, you cannot allow arbitrary HTML for security reasons.

gen2brain 10mo ago
I often use <img> with "width" on GitHub, so that I do not have the scrollbars on the main page, and one can click on the image to see the original size. It is ugly, but what is the alternative in Markdown? Several images instead of one?
deleted 10mo ago
[deleted]
thayne 10mo ago
Github has a very limited subset of html that is allowed. Slack doesn't allow html (although it also doesn't allow all markdown). If you are converting to something other than html, such as a manpage, using html tags generally doesn't work.
immibis 10mo ago
Why's anyone still using Reddit? I heard they just locked down their API again, to verified developers now.
- littlestymaar 10mo ago
  Network effect, the same reason why the magnificent seven are worth more than a trillion dollar each.

a3w 10mo ago

I also used pandoc and markdown, and never bothered going back to ascidoc, full HTML, or latex. Footnotes are the only not always included extension to mmarkdown I need for slides or argument flows that are not killed by sidenotes, and some sites and toolings support that in markdown. Even table of contents is not a problem, so what else is left? Formula setting? Buttons for UI vs function? Buttons plus Inline JS for step by step state modification? I am not programming, I want text and something to be easily pasted into Word-like rich text, which seems to be the default text editor for emails for 90% of the population.