Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Installation
  3. Post sidebar sections
  4. Dedicated menus
  5. Front Matter
  6. Additional information

Introduction

Ultimate Markdown helps you work with the Markdown syntax by providing tools to import, export, and modify Markdown documents.

Installation

Refer to the installation guide for setup and update instructions. The information available in this document applies to all our WordPress plugins.

Post sidebar sections

The plugin adds three new sections in the sidebar of your posts, pages, or custom post types.

To access these sections, open the post sidebar with the cog icons available in the top-right area of the screen. Then select the Post tab of the sidebar.

Import Markdown

Use the Import Markdown section to generate the post content from a Markdown file available on your computer.

  1. Open the Import Markdown section
  2. Click the Upload file and import button
  3. Select a Markdown file available on your computer

Load Markdown

With this section, you can replace the existing post content with content generated from a document stored in the plugin. See the Documents and Import sections for more information on creating a document.

  1. Open the Load Markdown section
  2. Select a document stored in the plugin with the Markdown document selector
  3. Click the Submit document button to complete the process

Submit Markdown

The Submit Markdown section allows you to generate the post content from a provided text string.

  1. Open the Submit Markdown section
  2. Enter text with the Markdown markup in the Markdown text textarea
  3. Click the Submit text button to complete the process

Dedicated menus

Documents

From the Documents menu you can create, duplicate, edit, or delete Markdown documents.

Create a document

Use this procedure to create a document:

  1. Enter the Title of the document
  2. Enter the Content of the document
  3. Click the Add Document button

Tools

This menu provides centralized access to bulk import and export operations. It’s divided into two sections: the Import section, which is used to import Markdown content into the plugin, and the Export section, which allows you to export documents.

Import

Use the Import section to generate plugin-managed Markdown documents from Markdown files available on your computer.

  1. Click the Choose files button to select one or more Markdown files from your computer.
  2. Click the Upload files and import button to start the process.
  3. Once the import is complete, a dismissible notice will display the list of generated items. The generated content will be available in the Documents menu.

Export

Use the Export section to generate compressed archives (.zip) of Markdown files from existing plugin-managed Markdown content available in the Documents menu.

  1. Visit the Markdown → Tools menu
  2. Click the Export button

Front Matter

The Front Matter feature of Ultimate Markdown allows you to configure a WordPress post by adding key-value pairs at the beginning of the Markdown file.

Using Front Matter

Front Matter must be included at the beginning of the file and take the form of valid YAML set between triple-dashed lines.

In the following Markdown file, Front Matter is used to configure post title, post excerpt, and post status:

---
title: The post title
excerpt: The post excerpt
status: private
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Supported keys

The plugin supports the following Front Matter keys:

KeyValueWordPress Post Setting
titleStringPost title
excerptStringPost excerpt
categoriesArray (An array of category IDs or category names)Post categories
tagsArray (An array of tag IDs or tag names)Post tags
authorString (The ID or login name of the author)Post author
dateString (The post date in the “YYYY-MM-DD hh:mm:ss” format) (E.g. 2022-04-16 10:30:42)Post date
statusString (The accepted values are: publish, future, draft, pending, private, trash)Post status

Examples

Set the post title

---
title: The post title
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Set the post excerpt

---
excerpt: The post excerpt
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Set the categories

---
categories:
  - Category 1
  - Category 2
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Set the tags

---
tags:
  - Tag 1
  - Tag 2
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Set the post status

---
status: private
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Set the post author

---
author: John Doe
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Set the post date

---
date: 2022-04-16 10:30:42
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

A Markdown document that uses all the supported keys

---
title: The post title
excerpt: The post excerpt
categories:
  - Category 1
  - Category 2
tags:
  - Tag 1
  - Tag 2
author: John Doe
date: 2022-04-16 10:30:42
status: private
---

## First Heading

Paragraph Content.

Common parsing problems

The plugin may ignore all the defined Front Matter keys or specific Front Matter keys when:

  • The YAML format is not valid.
  • The Front Matter keys don’t exist.
  • The Front Matter values are not valid. (E.g. When the post date is specified in the wrong format, when the configured post status doesn’t exist.)

Additional information

Uploads

The maximum number of files you can upload in a single upload operation is limited by the max_file_uploads directive defined in the php.ini file.

This directive’s value determines the maximum number of files that can be processed in the Tools menu during import operations.

Supported Markdown file extensions

The import form available in the Tools menu supports Markdown files with the following extensions:

  • .md
  • .markdown
  • .mdown
  • .mkdn
  • .mkd
  • .mdwn
  • .mdtxt
  • .mdtext
  • .text
  • .txt

Credits

This product makes use of the following resources: