Obsidian’s Markdown dialect is called Obsidian Flavored Markdown (OFM). OFM is based on [[en/Features/Markdown/GitHub Flavored Markdown|GitHub Flavored Markdown (GFM)]], with additions and some deviations.
Unfortunately, Obsidian does not publish formal specification for OFM. Due to the lack of specification, Macana’s support for OFM is best-effort.
- Basic formatting syntax - Obsidian Help
- Advanced formatting syntax - Obsidian Help
- Obsidian Flavored Markdown - Obsidian Help
Supported features
Wikilinks
By default, Obsidian uses their own variant of wikilink for internal links.
To use this link style, surround the target file name without file extension or path to the file from the Vault root (document root) without file extension, with [[ and ]].
- [[Overview|Alternative Title]]
- [[Overview]]
- [[Overview#Arbitrary document tree]]
- [[GitHub Flavored Markdown#^alert-callout-compat]]
- [[Overview|Alternative Title]]
- [[Overview]]
- [[Overview#Arbitrary document tree]]
- [[GitHub Flavored Markdown#^alert-callout-compat]]
Block identifier
Macana can generate corresponding anchor point if you create a block identifier. Links to automatically generated block identifier is not supported.
This is a paragraph. ^block-ident-demo
This is a paragraph. ^block-ident-demo
Since Macana strictly parse Markdown, block identifier separated by more than one newline characters is treated as a regular text, even though Obsidian treat that as a block identifier for the previous block. Because of this, you can’t reference the entire list. This restriction may be removed if Obsidian published formal and correct specification for their Markdown flavor.
- Foo
- Bar
^Baz
- Foo
- Bar
^Baz
Image size attributes
Add a vertical pipe (|) following text specifying image dimensions to set the image size inside image’s alt text.
Embeds
You can embeds files in accepted file formats by adding ! right before the wikilink’s opening square brackets.
Images
To set the display image size, add a vertical pipe (|) following text specifying image dimension.
![[dog.jpg|128x128]]
![[dog.jpg|128x128]]
Another documents
Put an exclamation symbol ! before internal wikilink to make it a document embeds.
As you can see in the below examples, Macana embeds the target document directly inside body without any modifications. The embedded section affects embedder’s document outline. Place the embed inside blockquote if you want to it to be shown as quote.
![[GitHub Flavored Markdown#Strikethrough]]
> ![[GitHub Flavored Markdown#Strikethrough]]
![[GitHub Flavored Markdown#Strikethrough]]
![[GitHub Flavored Markdown#Strikethrough]]
Highlights
Surround text with == to make the text highlighted.
==Hello, World!==
==Hello, World!==
Callouts
> [!info]+ Title, _Italic_
> Both title and body can contain Markdown.
[!info]+ Title, Italic Both title and body can contain Markdown.
Mathematical expressions
Macana supports mathematical expressions, both inline one ($) and block one ($$).
Macana uses Temml while Obsidian uses MathJax, in order to support environments without JavaScript. Possible differences including, but not limited to:
- Resulting graphics differs (Macana uses standard MathML, Obsidian uses MathJax’s SVG output)
- Certain LaTeX macros available on Obsidian but not on Macana and vice versa.
- Rendering differences between User Agents due to rendering engines and/or available fonts.
This is an inline math expression $e^{2i\pi} = 1$.
This is an inline math expression $e^{2i\pi} = 1$.
$$
\begin{vmatrix}a & b\\
c & d
\end{vmatrix}=ad-bc
$$
$$ \begin{vmatrix}a & b\ c & d \end{vmatrix}=ad-bc $$
Comments
Surround portion of text with %% to exclude them from the output HTML.
Foo %%Bar%% Baz
%%
This entire block
should not be in the output HTML.
%%
Foo %%Bar%% Baz
%% This entire block
should not be in the output HTML. %%
Unsupported features
Nested callouts
For a technical reason, Macana currently cannot parse nested callouts. This example is from Obsidian help document:
> [!question] Can callouts be nested?
> > [!todo] Yes!, they can.
> > > [!example] You can even use multiple layers of nesting.
[!question] Can callouts be nested? > [!todo] Yes!, they can. > > [!example] You can even use multiple layers of nesting.