.. _developers-rst-for-markdown-expats: ReStructured Text for those who know Markdown ============================================= You can think of RST as "Markdown, but much better". Meaning: #. RST is basically just as simple as Markdown #. But RST is both more precise, and has more available formatting constructs (without getting crazy complicated) The full Sphinx / RST documentation is available here: https://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/master/index.html If you're familiar with Markdown, the following sections contain some tips to get you started in RST. Whitespace and indenting ------------------------ * MD: Whitespace and indenting generally doesn't matter in most cases. It does matter with bullets and sub bullets, but the rules get pretty weird, and vary between different Markdown renderers. * RST: **Indenting matters**. A lot. Just like Python. In general, you indent all RST text to keep it within the same level. For example, all this text would be a single paragraph **Blank lines also matter**. A lot. You use blank lines to delimit sections within an indenting level. For example, the blank line before this paragraph denotes a paragraph break. .. note:: RST was created by the Python community. Hence, whitespace is quite important. * Indenting matters * Blank lines between content matter Using a blank line and outdenting indicates the end of the previous item. For example, this paragraph is not part of the MD/RST bulleted list. Fixed width font ---------------- * MD: Use single quotes: .. code-block:: md `hello world` * RST: Use a pair of single quotes: .. code-block:: rst ``hello world`` Italics ------- * MD: ``*hello world*`` or ``_hello world_`` * RST: ``*hello world*`` Boldface -------- * MD: ``**hello world**`` * RST: Same as MD Chapter and section delimiters ------------------------------ * MD: Either use one or more pound signs (#, ##, ###) to the left of the line of text, or underline the line of text with pound signs * RST: Have a single line of text, underlined by non-ASCII characters. * The length of the underlying *must* be at least as long as the line of text * Which non-ASCII character is used for the underlying does not matter, but the order in which they are used denotes chapters / sections / subsections / etc. In these PRRTE docs, the sequence of underline characters we use are: .. code-block:: rst Chapter 1: hello world ====================== .. code-block:: rst Section 1: hello world ---------------------- .. code-block:: rst Subsection 1: hello world ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ .. code-block:: rst Subsubsection 1: hello world ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Meaning: underlines made of ``=`` denotes chapters, underlines made of ``-`` denotes sections, underlines made of ``^`` denotes subsections, and underlines made of ``+`` denote subsubsections. Multi-line code/fixed-width font -------------------------------- * MD: Use three single quotes to delimit blocks of text. Optionally include a token keyword to denote the syntax highlighting to use inside that block. .. code-block:: md ```c int main() { printf("Hello world\n"); return 0 } ``` * RST: Use ``.. code-block:: KEYWORD`` to start a section of code. .. code-block:: rst .. code-block:: c int main() { printf("Hello world\n"); return 0 } * KEYWORD indicates which syntax highlighting to use (e.g., ``c``, ``c++`` ``make``, ``sh``, ``ini``, ``Fortran``, ``diff``, ``python``, ``java``, ``rst``, ... etc.). * KEYWORD can be omitted if no specific highlighting is to be used. * There *MUST* be a blank line after the ``code-block`` line. * The lines in the block must be indented to the same column as the first ``c`` in ``code-block``. For example: .. code-block:: rst .. code-block:: sh shell$ tar xf prte-.tar.bz2 shell$ cd prte- shell$ ./configure --prefix= |& tee config.out Note that the code block will be rendered at the same level as where the first ``.`` of ``.. code-block::`` starts. In this case, the example code block will be rendered in the bulleted item. Whereas this parargraph and code block will be outside of the above bulleted list: .. code-block:: sh shell$ tar xf prte-.tar.bz2 shell$ cd prte- shell$ ./configure --prefix= |& tee config.out # Fun note: the code-block can contain blank lines. The code-block is terminated by a blank line and then outdent back to the same level as the first ``.`` in ``.. code-block::``. Un-numbered bullets ------------------- * MD: Start lines with ``*`` or ``-`` * RST: Start lines with ``*``. You can wrap lines at the same indenting level to make paragraphs in the same bullet. Having a blank line and then more text at the same indenting level makes another paragraph in the same bullet. You even put other directives in this same indenting level. * For example, you can start a sub bullet. This text is the next paragraph in the same sub bullet. .. code-block:: none This is a verbatim code block within this same sub bullet. More about code-blocks below. This is the next paragraph (after the code block) in the same sub bullet. * If you start a new bullet, that terminates the previous bullet. * You **MUST** put blank lines between bullets! Numbered bullets: ----------------- * MD: Start lines with ``#`` * RST: Start lines with ``#.`` .. important:: Yes, the trailing ``.`` is important For example: .. code-block:: rst #. Item number 1 #. The second item #. A third item All the same rules for indentation apply as described above. Comments -------- * MD: Enclose content in ```` (i.e., HTML comments, but they are included in the output) * RST: Start a line with two periods and a space. For example, the following block is a comment, and will not be included in the output: .. code-block:: rst .. Hello world. This is a comment. This whole block is a comment. You can leave it here in the final document, and it will not be included in the rendered output. Your comment can even include blank lines. You terminate a comment -- just like most other things in RST -- by a blank line and then outdenting back out to the same column as the first ".". This line is no longer part of the comment. Including files --------------- * MD: You cannot include files in Markdown. * RST: Use the ``.. include:: FILENAME`` directive. For example: .. code-block:: rst .. include:: features-extensions.rst .. include:: features-java.rst Those directives include those 2 files right here in this RST file. .. important:: Chapter/section/subsection delimiters will be continued in those files as part of rendering this file. Hyperlinks to URLs ------------------ * MD: .. code-block:: md [this is the link text](https://example.com/) * RST: .. code-block:: rst `this is the link text `_ .. important:: Yes, the trailing underscore in RST is important. It's a little weird, but you'll cope. Hyperlinks to anchors --------------------- * MD: I forget offhand how to make anchors and links to them in MD. * RST: Use the ``:ref:`` directive. Make an anchor like this: .. code-block:: rst .. _ANCHOR_NAME: It *must* start with and underscore and end with a colon. I've typically used anchor names that either begin with ``label-`` or end in ``-label`` to make it blatantly obvious that it's a label. For example: .. code-block:: rst .. _building-and-installing-section-label: Then you can use the ``:ref:`` directive: .. code-block:: rst be sure to see :ref:`the VPATH build section `. Hyperlinks to other (RST) pages ------------------------------- * MD: .. code-block:: md [link text](page_name) * RST: Use the ``:doc:`` directive. General format: .. code-block:: rst :doc:`link text ` For example: .. code-block:: rst You should read :doc:`the Developer's Guide `. The page path is relative to the ``docs`` dir in the PRRTE git tree. Macros ------ * MD: There are no macros in Markdown. * RST: We have defined a few PRRTE-specific macros in RST. You can insert these macros anywhere in RST content text. * ``|ompi_ver|`` is the full PRRTE version number, including alpha/beta/rc/greek denotation. For example ``5.0.0rc1``. * ``|ompi_series|`` is the major/minor PRRTE version, e.g., ``5.0.x``. .. important:: Think twice about hard-coding the PRRTE version number or series when referring to the current version or series. It can be appropriate to hard-code an "x.y.0" version to denote a generational epoch, but in most other cases, you probably want to use one of the macros. * ``|mdash|`` is a unicode long dash, an "em" dash. Use it instead of ``--``. * ``|rarrow|`` is a unicode right arrow. Use it instead of ``->`` or ``-->``. Brightly-colored boxes ---------------------- * MD: There are no brightly-colored boxes in MD. * RST: You can use various directives to make brightly-colored "note" boxes (Called admonitions) in RST. For example: .. important:: a green box with a "!" icon Standard indenting rules apply for the content in the box. You can have multiple lines and multiple paragraphs, for example. Yippee. * You can even have bullets. .. code-block:: none You can even have code blocks inside the bullet inside the caution box. * All the standard indenting rules apply. .. hint:: a green box with a "!" icon .. note:: a blue box with a "!" icon .. caution:: an orange box with a "!" icon .. attention:: an orange box with a "!" icon .. warning:: an orange box with a "!" icon .. error:: a red box with a "!" icon .. danger:: a red box with a "!" icon .. admonition:: Custom title :class: tip You can name this box whatever you want: .. code-block:: rst .. admonition:: Custom title :class: tip Content of your box here. Custom text for this custom admonition. Note that the ``:class: `` will change the coloring to the color for the basic admonition of that type. E.g., ``:class: tip`` makes the box be green.