Wiki Syntax

About wiki syntax

Wiki syntax is a markup language used in a wiki web page. (For a broader overview of wiki syntax, please see Why Wiki Syntax Is Important.) To avoid requiring users to learn HTML, wiki syntax uses common characters in uncommon ways (or character combinations that are not normally used together) and provides them with a special meaning. Some of the character combinations only work at the beginning of a line, while others can be inserted anywhere in the text and are active until a closing combination of characters is met.

Wiki syntax uses a character repeated twice for most functions, but it also has a few two-character combinations. With a two-character combination, the characters are reversed to turn off the function. Monospaced text provides a good example of this; the minus (-) and plus (+) characters are used to start the using monospaced text and plus (+) and minus (-) characters specify the end of it.

Quick reference - basic text formatting

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Basic text formatting

The wiki syntax described in this section can be located anywhere in the text so that specific characters, words, or sentences can be emphasized.

Colored text

Text can be any color you want it to be. Two tildes ( ~ ) are used followed by the name of a color and a colon ( : ) to specify the start of the colored text. Two more tildes ( ~ ) are used to end the section of colored text.

Colored text can also be specified using HTML hex color codes. (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_colors). The syntax is two tildes ( ~ ) followed by the pound ( # ) character and the hex numbers with a colon ( : ) followed by the text to be colored. Two tildes mark the end of the colored text.

Bold text

Two underscore ( _ ) characters are used to make text bold.

Italic text

Two single quote ( ' ) characters are used to make text italic.

Underlined text

Three equal ( = ) characters are used to underline text.

Strikethrough text

Use two hyphens ( - ) to create strike-through text.

Centered text

Two colon ( : ) characters are used to center text or other content. The centered-text syntax (which create a centered HTML div) can be used in conjunction with a box, a table, or other page element.

Monospace text

Monospace text is useful when displaying code and can be created in two ways. When an entire line is to be monospace, simply start the new line with one or more spaces. For instances of monospace text within a line of normal text, use a combination of minus (-) and plus (+) characters before and (reversing their poisitions) after the monospace text.

When using monospace text, keep the line length short. If the line is too long, it may cause page display problems.
Leading-space monospace text is an option and may be disabled on the Tiki site.

Text box

Apply one caret at start and end of text or other content to display it with a border (in a box).

Example: ^This text is in a box.^ produces:

Technical note: The box is an HTML div class="simplebox" (prior to Tiki 13) or "well" (Tiki 13 - 18) whose appearance depends on the theme stylesheet in use.

Plain text

To turn off wiki formatting, surround the text with "np" (or "no processing/parsing") tags.

NOTE: np tags cannot be used within an np block. To display an unprocessed ~np~ tag, escape all the characters (not just the tildes) while in normal processing mode:

~126~~110~~112~~126~ produces: ~np~
~126~~47~~110~~112~~126~ produces: ~/np~

Indent

(Prior to Tiki 13) Text can be indented using HTML definition list formatting, which in wiki syntax is created using a combination of the ; and : characters. ; must appear at the beginning of a line and : must appear between introduction text and the indented text. The introduction text portion is useful for forming definition type indention like Example 1 below. However the introduction text can be eliminated by simply including ;: together followed by the text as shown in Example 2.

Using square brackets

To include square brackets in text (that is, as regular text and not to create an external link, which square brackets normally do in wiki syntax) simply add an additional opening bracket at the beginning.

Non-breaking space

Use ~hs~ to add the HTML " " for a hard space, or non-breaking space.

Comments

Wiki comment

~tc~This is a wiki comment. ~/tc~

It will be stored with the page and can be seen in the edit-page view but not seen when the page or page source is viewed.

HTML Comment

~hc~ This is an HTML comment. ~/hc~

It will be stored with the page and will generate an HTML comment of the form

<!-- This is an HTML comment. -->

it will not be seen when the page is viewed but will be seen when the page source is viewed.

Wiki Syntax in Smarty Templates

To use wiki syntax in smarty templates use the following:

{wiki}
    ! Headline
    Put your wiki syntax here.
{/wiki}

Related pages

Wiki-Syntax Images
Wiki-Syntax Links
Wiki-Syntax Lists
Wiki-Syntax Special Characters
Wiki-Syntax Tables
Wiki Argument Variables
Advanced Wiki Syntax usage examples
Plugins advanced features/formatting that can be included in wiki pages

Useful Links

• Why Wiki Syntax is Important
• The Color Picker II is located at http://www.pagetutor.com/pagetutor/makapage/picker/
• Web Developer extension for Mozilla Firefox
• Wiki syntax is not standardised across applications. There has been an initiative to publish wiki syntax as an RFC from the IETF. See RFCWiki.