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https://github.com/xolox/python-preview-markup

Live preview Markdown and reStructuredText files as HTML in a web browser
https://github.com/xolox/python-preview-markup

Last synced: 7 days ago
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Live preview Markdown and reStructuredText files as HTML in a web browser

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README 

        
preview-markup: Live preview Markdown and reStructuredText files

================================================================



The `preview-markup` program takes a text file with lightweight markup

(Markdown_ and reStructuredText_ are supported) and shows a live preview of the

markup rendered to HTML in your web browser. When you save your text file the

preview is automatically updated within a couple of seconds. That's all there

is to it!



.. contents::

   :local:



Installation

------------



The `preview-markup` program is written in Python and is available on PyPI_

which means installation should be as simple as:



.. code-block:: sh



   $ pip install preview-markup



There's actually a multitude of ways to install Python packages (e.g. the `per

user site-packages directory`_, `virtual environments`_ or just installing

system wide) and I have no intention of getting into that discussion here, so

if this intimidates you then read up on your options before returning to these

instructions ;-).



Required system packages

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



The `preview-markup` program uses the Misaka_ package for Markdown parsing

because it's compatible with GitHub Flavored Markdown. This may require you to

ensure that the libffi development files are installed before you attempt to

install `preview-markup`. On Debian and Ubuntu based systems this can be

accomplished as follows:



.. code-block:: sh



   $ sudo apt-get install libffi-dev



Getting started

---------------



To get started you simply run the command ``preview-markup``. If you give it a

filename as an argument then that file will be previewed, otherwise the

``README.md`` or ``README.rst`` file in the current working directory is

previewed.



If you want to run `preview-markup` in the background then you probably won't

appreciate the logging to the terminal that is enabled by default. In this case

I suggest you use the following command line:



.. code-block:: sh



   $ preview-markup -q &



The ``-q`` is short for ``--quiet`` and the ``&`` instructs your shell to run

the program in the background. If you want to kill the program later on just

run the ``fg`` command (this will bring the program back to the foreground) and

then press Control-C (this will kill the program).



Future improvements

-------------------



Some random ideas for future improvements (I may implement these as time

permits or when I feel like programming but don't feel like picking up one of

my many other projects):



Automatically close orphaned windows

 When the command line program is terminated the browser window or tab page

 that was previously opened should be closed automatically. This can probably

 be implemented using a JavaScript call to the server to check if the server is

 still alive, if not then just call ``window.close()``.



Instant updates instead of meta refresh

 Right now there's a hard coded 10 second meta refresh in the HTML template. It

 would be a lot more elegant if the server used inotify or something similar to

 instantly detect changes and push those to the browser client. For now the

 meta refresh achieves the main goal though :-).



Why this project?

-----------------



Different variations of `preview-markup` have lived in my private dotfiles

repository for years now (I track ``~/bin`` in my dotfiles repository). Over

those years the program has had several names and very similar yet slightly

different purposes. By the time I decided to clean up these "variations on a

similar theme" I was using several different shell and Python scripts working

together to do the same things that `preview-markup` now does. I decided to

merge, cleanup, document and publish that mess of Python and shell scripts for

multiple reasons:



1. I wanted to merge all of the features that I'd grown to appreciate into a

   single coherent piece of software that was easy and intuitive to use (and

   written in Python so I could more easily maintain it :-).



2. I wanted to manage the installation of that software as a Python package

   with properly specified dependencies where a single ``pip install`` was

   enough to get things going.



3. Last but not least: Given the effort I'd already put into it, it seemed a

   shame not to share my work with the world.



Similar projects

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



I created `preview-markup` because I couldn't find a tool that provided live

previews of Markdown_ *and* reStructuredText_ markup and just because it was

fun to work on, however *this is clearly an itch that dozens of developers have

scratched over the years* :-). Here are some similar projects that I've run

into and/or used in the past:



`restview `_

 Live preview of reStructuredText_ files. A personal favorite of mine, simple

 and sweet, does exactly what is promises. Written in Python.



`grip `_

 Provides local previews of Markdown files exactly as GitHub renders them by

 using the GitHub API to render the Markdown to HTML. Written in Python.



`markdown-live `_

 Live preview of Markdown files. Written in JavaScript (using Node.js).



`github-markdown-preview `_

 Live preview of Markdown files. Makes it an explicit goal to render things

 just like GitHub does. Written in Ruby.



Contact

-------



The latest version of `preview-markup` is available on PyPI_ and GitHub_. For

bug reports please create an issue on GitHub_. If you have questions,

suggestions, etc. feel free to send me an e-mail at `[email protected]`_.



License

-------



This software is licensed under the `MIT license`_.



© 2018 Peter Odding.



.. External references:

.. _GitHub: https://github.com/xolox/python-preview-markup

.. _Markdown: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markdown

.. _Misaka: https://pypi.python.org/pypi/misaka

.. _MIT license: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License

.. _per user site-packages directory: https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0370/

.. [email protected]: [email protected]

.. _PyPI: https://pypi.python.org/pypi/preview-markup

.. _reStructuredText: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReStructuredText

.. _virtual environments: http://docs.python-guide.org/en/latest/dev/virtualenvs/