Writing

You don't need to remember any markdown. The toolbar writes it for you. Select some text and press a button, or press a button and start typing. Press a text, heading or list button again to undo it.

Not sure what something does? The ? button at the end opens a short markdown cheat sheet. In a narrow window the buttons show only their icons; hover over one to see its name.

There are two ways to look at a doc. Switch between them at the right of the toolbar.

• Live shows the doc formatted as you type. This is where most people write.
• Split puts the raw markdown on the left and the finished page on the right. It needs a wider window. Drag the line in the middle to resize the two sides, and double-click it to reset.

A few more things help you focus:

• Outline lists the headings in your doc, so you can jump around a long one.
• Focus mode hides everything except your writing. Press Esc to come back.
• Aa changes how docs read on this device: a sans or serif font, an extra-readable one called Easy read, and the text size.

These are the ones you'll use most. On Windows and Linux, use Ctrl where you see ⌘.

Press ⌘⇧P to open the command palette. It's a search box for everything: every formatting and view command, every doc by name, and a set of templates to start from.

The templates are Meeting notes, To-do list, README, Blog post, Bug report and Decision record. A new doc from a template goes into the folder you last clicked, just like New doc.

Markdown covers the everyday things: tables, checklists, strikethrough, and code that is coloured by its language.

const greeting = '# Hello, markpad';

You can also write maths. Put a formula between $…$ inside a sentence, or between $$…$$ on its own line. It uses LaTeX, the usual language for maths, and Formula on the toolbar starts one for you:

And you can draw diagrams by describing them in a mermaid code block. Diagram on the toolbar starts one:

flowchart LR
  Draft --> Share --> Publish

A little HTML works too, such as <details> for a section your readers can open and close. Anything that could run code, like scripts or embeds, is removed for safety.

Want to leave yourself a reminder that nobody else sees? Comment wraps text in <!-- -->. It stays in your markdown, but it never shows on the page, on a shared link or in a download.

Once you're signed in, paste or drag an image straight into your doc. PNG, JPEG, WebP and GIF all work, up to 1 MB each, and up to 50 a day. Drag a corner of an image to resize it.

An image is as private as the doc it's in. When you share the doc, your readers see its images too.

You're never locked in. You can bring files in and take your writing out at any time.

• Open .md file… turns markdown files into new docs, in the folder you last clicked. You can also drag .md, .markdown or .txt files onto the window.
• Download saves a doc as .md, .html or .pdf. Export all docs saves everything as one .zip, with your folders kept.

Made a change you regret? History keeps earlier versions of each doc. Markpad saves one every 10 minutes while you type, and another whenever an app or someone with an edit link changes the doc. It keeps the latest 30, and you can bring any of them back.

The thin bar along the bottom shows how many words you have and how long the doc takes to read, where your cursor is, and whether everything is saved.