📸 Page Elements: Writing content with Markdown, LaTeX, and Shortcodes

Rich content can be written in Wowchemy using Markdown, LaTeX math, and Shortcodes. This article gives an overview of the most common formatting options, including features that are exclusive to Wowchemy.

Shortcodes are plugins which are bundled with Wowchemy or inherited from Hugo. Additionally, HTML may be written in Markdown documents for advanced formatting.
Table of Contents

Sub-headings

After the page title, heading 1, we can format sub-headings in the page body:

## Heading 2
### Heading 3
#### Heading 4

Emphasis

Bold, Italic, Strikethrough

Italics with _underscores_.

Bold with **asterisks**.

Combined emphasis with **asterisks and _underscores_**.

Strikethrough with ~~two tildes~~.

Italics with underscores.

Bold with asterisks.

Combined emphasis with asterisks and underscores.

Strikethrough with two tildes.

Text color

Add the HTML color attribute in the form {style="color: red"} to the line after a Markdown block.

For example, to color a paragraph red:

Red colored text
{style="color: red"}

Blockquote

> This is a blockquote.

This is a blockquote.

Highlight quote

This is a {{< hl >}}highlighted quote{{< /hl >}}.

This is a highlighted quote.

Lists

Ordered

1. First item
   1. A sub-item
2. Another item
  1. First item
    1. A sub-item
  2. Another item

Unordered

- First item
  - A sub-item
- Another item
  • First item
    • A sub-item
  • Another item

Todo

Todo lists can be written in Wowchemy by using the standard Markdown syntax:

- [x] Write math example
  - [x] Write diagram example
- [ ] Do something else

renders as

  • Write math example
    • Write diagram example
  • Do something else

Toggle lists

Add a toggle list to a page to reveal text, such as an answer to a question, after a toggle button is clicked.

Useful for FAQs, spoilers, or hiding answers when teaching online courses.

{{< spoiler text="Click to view the spoiler" >}}
You found me!
{{< /spoiler >}}

renders as

Click to view the spoiler

You found me!

Link to a page

[I'm an external link](https://www.google.com)
[A post]({{< relref "/post/my-page-name" >}})
[A publication]({{< relref "/publication/my-page-name" >}})
[A project]({{< relref "/project/my-page-name" >}})
[A relative link from one post to another post]({{< relref "../my-page-name" >}})
[Scroll down to a page section with heading *Hi*](#hi)

You can also create a button link in the page header of any page except Widget Pages (the homepage).

You can create a button link to a file in the page header of any page except Widget Pages (the homepage).

Otherwise, to link to a file, such as a PDF, in the body of your content, place the file in your static/uploads/ folder and then link to it using the following form:

{{% staticref "uploads/cv.pdf" "newtab" %}}Download my CV{{% /staticref %}}

The optional "newtab" argument for staticref will cause the link to be opened in a new tab.

Cite

To cite a page or publication, you can use the cite shortcode, referencing a folder and page name that you created:

{{< cite page="/publication/preprint" view="citation" >}}

where view corresponds to one of the available listing views used throughout Wowchemy:

  1. Stream
  2. Compact
  3. Card
  4. Citation - a traditional academic citation, configured by the citation_style setting in params.yaml

If you don’t specify a view, it will default to the compact view.

Table of Contents

A table of contents can help users navigate long pages.

Paste the {{< toc >}} shortcode wherever you would like a table of contents to appear in your page.

You may also wish to consider using the book layout which displays a built-in table of contents in a right sidebar on large screens.

When using the book layout, you may still wish to add an in-page table of contents which only appears when the right sidebar is hidden. You can do this with {{< toc hide_on="xl" >}}.

Footnotes

I have more [^1] to say.

[^1]: Footnote example.

I have more 1 to say.

Figures

To cross-reference a figure, provide it with an ID, for example: {{< figure src="image.jpg" id="wowchemy" >}}.

The figure can now be cross-referenced with a link in the form [A Figure](#figure-wowchemy).

Tags and Categories

Use {{< list_tags >}} to provide a list of linked tags or {{< list_categories >}} to provide a list of linked categories.

Call-to-Action Buttons

Create buttons and call-to-actions (CTA) with the CTA shortcode.

Example CTA button:

{{< cta cta_text="Do something" cta_link="/" cta_new_tab="false" >}}

Example CTA button with a link to an alternate action:

{{< cta cta_text="Do something" cta_link="/" cta_new_tab="false" cta_alt_text="Alternative action" cta_alt_link="/" cta_alt_new_tab="false" >}}

Mention a user

To mention someone, type {{% mention "username" %}} where username corresponds to a user account in Wowchemy.

List child pages

To list child pages, such as to list book sections from a book chapter, use {{< list_children >}}.

Images

Single image

Images may be added to a page by either placing them in your assets/media/ media library or in your page’s folder, and then referencing them using one of the following notations.

Figures are themeable according to light/dark mode and can also be cross-referenced.

A figure from your page’s folder or your assets/media/ media library:

![screen reader text](image.jpg "caption")

For more customizable figures, we can use the built-in Figure shortcode rather than the Markdown figure syntax above.

A numbered figure with a caption:

{{< figure src="image.jpg" caption="A caption" numbered="true" >}}

Using light/dark mode? Did you know that you can create dynamically themed light/dark images?

Dynamically theme images according to the user's light/dark preference
Dynamically theme images according to the user’s light/dark preference

To dynamically theme images according to the user’s light or dark theme

  • {{< figure src="image.jpg" caption="test" theme="light" >}} inverts image when browsing in dark mode
  • {{< figure src="image.jpg" caption="test" theme="dark" >}} inverts image when browsing in light mode

Alternatively, paste a themeable inline SVG image in the form <svg fill="currentColor">...</svg> directly into your Markdown.

To add an image gallery to a page:

  1. Create a photo album folder in assets/media/albums/
    • Album names must be lowercase due to a Hugo bug - consider up-voting the bug with a 👍
  2. Add images to your album folder
  3. Paste {{< gallery album="<ALBUM-FOLDER>" >}} where you would like the gallery to appear in the page content, changing the album parameter to match the name of your album folder

How can I change the size or shape of gallery images?

Simply add resize_options when you call the gallery shortcode. This option lets you control the shape/size of gallery images using the standard Hugo resize options. For example:

{{< gallery album="<ALBUM-FOLDER>" resize_options="250x250" >}}

How can I add captions to gallery images?

Optionally, to add captions for your images, add the following instances to the end of your page’s front matter:

gallery_item:
- album: <ALBUM FOLDER>
  image: <IMAGE 1 NAME>.jpg
  caption: Write your image 1 caption here
- album: <ALBUM FOLDER>
  image: <IMAGE 2 NAME>.jpg
  caption: Write your image 2 caption here

Inline image

Wowchemy enables you to use a wide range of inline images (aka icons) from Font Awesome and Academicons in addition to emojis. There is also an issue open to add support for custom images.

Here are some examples using the icon shortcode to render icons:

{{< icon name="terminal" pack="fas" >}} Terminal  
{{< icon name="python" pack="fab" >}} Python  
{{< icon name="r-project" pack="fab" >}} R

renders as

Terminal
Python
R

Optionally, left and right padding can be added to an icon using the padding_left="3" and padding_right="3" options, respectively.

Emojis

An emoji can be inserted using either an emoji keyboard or by typing the name of the emoji.

Don’t have an emoji keyboard?

Copy and paste emoji names from the Emoji cheat sheet. The following serves as an example, but remember to remove the added spaces between each emoji name and surrounding colons:

I : heart : Wowchemy : smile :

I ❤️ Wowchemy 😄

Twitter

Embed a feed

Design your timeline on Twitter and paste it into a Markdown page.

Embed a single tweet

To include a single tweet, pass the tweet’s user (case-insensitive) and ID from the URL as parameters to the shortcode:

{{< tweet user="SanDiegoZoo" id="1453110110599868418" >}}

Callouts

Wowchemy supports a Markdown extension for callouts, also referred to as alerts or asides.

Callouts are a useful feature to draw attention to important or related content such as notes, hints, or warnings in your articles. They are especially handy when writing educational tutorial-style articles or documentation.

A callout can be created by using the Callout shortcode below.

Wowchemy comes built-in with a few different styles of callouts.

The paragraph will render as a callout with the default note style:

{{% callout note %}}
A Markdown callout is useful for displaying notices, hints, or definitions to your readers.
{{% /callout %}}

This will display the following note block:

A Markdown callout is useful for displaying notices, hints, or definitions to your readers.

Alternatively, a warning can be displayed to the reader using the warning option:

{{% callout warning %}}
Here's some important information...
{{% /callout %}}

This will display the following warning notice to the reader:

Here’s some important information…

Audio

You can add a podcast or music to a page by placing the MP3 file in the page’s folder and then referencing the audio file using the audio shortcode:

{{< audio src="markvard.mp3" >}}

Videos

The following kinds of video may be added to a page.

Local video file

Videos may be added to a page by either placing them in your assets/media/ media library or in your page’s folder, and then referencing them using one of the following notations.

A video from your page folder or your assets/media/ media library:

{{< video src="my_video.mp4" controls="yes" >}}

Wowchemy will search for the video in your page folder and your media library at assets/media/.

External video file

{{< video src="https://example.com/my_video.mp4" controls="yes" >}}

If you don’t want video controls, remove the controls parameter and the video will autoplay with looping (great for memes!).

Note that browsers will block autoplay if the video contains sound.

Youtube:

{{< youtube w7Ft2ymGmfc >}}

Vimeo:

{{< vimeo 146022717 >}}

Charts

Wowchemy supports the popular Plotly chart format.

Save your Plotly JSON in your page folder, for example chart.json, and then add the {{< chart data="chart" >}} shortcode where you would like the chart to appear.

Demo:

You might also find the Plotly JSON Editor useful.

Mindmaps

Wowchemy supports a Markdown extension for mindmaps.

Simply insert a Markdown markmap code block and optionally set the height of the mindmap as shown in the first example below.

A simple mindmap defined as a Markdown list:


```markmap {height="200px"}
- Hugo Modules
  - wowchemy
  - wowchemy-plugins-netlify
  - wowchemy-plugins-netlify-cms
  - wowchemy-plugins-reveal
```

renders as

- Hugo Modules
  - wowchemy
  - wowchemy-plugins-netlify
  - wowchemy-plugins-netlify-cms
  - wowchemy-plugins-reveal

A more advanced mindmap with formatting, code blocks, and math:


```markmap
- Mindmaps
  - Links
    - [Wowchemy Docs](https://wowchemy.com/docs/)
    - [Discord Community](https://discord.gg/z8wNYzb)
    - [GitHub](https://github.com/wowchemy/wowchemy-hugo-themes)
  - Features
    - Markdown formatting
    - **inline** ~~text~~ *styles*
    - multiline
      text
    - `inline code`
    -
      ```js
      console.log('hello');
      console.log('code block');
      ```
    - Math: $x = {-b \pm \sqrt{b^2-4ac} \over 2a}$
```

renders as

- Mindmaps
  - Links
    - [Wowchemy Docs](https://wowchemy.com/docs/)
    - [Discord Community](https://discord.gg/z8wNYzb)
    - [GitHub](https://github.com/wowchemy/wowchemy-hugo-themes)
  - Features
    - Markdown formatting
    - **inline** ~~text~~ *styles*
    - multiline
      text
    - `inline code`
    -
      ```js
      console.log('hello');
      console.log('code block');
      ```
    - Math: $x = {-b \pm \sqrt{b^2-4ac} \over 2a}$

Embed Documents

The following kinds of document may be embedded into a page.

To embed Google Documents (e.g. slide deck), click File > Publish to web > Embed in Google Docs and copy the URL within the displayed src="..." attribute. Then paste the URL in the form:

{{< gdocs src="https://docs.google.com/..." >}}

Diagrams

Wowchemy supports the Mermaid Markdown extension for diagrams. Simply draw your diagram within a mermaid code block and it will be rendered when your page is published. Check out the Mermaid documentation and the Mermaid editor for more examples in addition to those below:

An example flowchart:

```mermaid
graph TD;
  A-->B;
  A-->C;
  B-->D;
  C-->D;
```

renders as

graph TD; A-->B; A-->C; B-->D; C-->D;

An example sequence diagram:

```mermaid
sequenceDiagram
  participant Alice
  participant Bob
  Alice->John: Hello John, how are you?
  loop Healthcheck
      John->John: Fight against hypochondria
  end
  Note right of John: Rational thoughts <br/>prevail...
  John-->Alice: Great!
  John->Bob: How about you?
  Bob-->John: Jolly good!
```

renders as

sequenceDiagram participant Alice participant Bob Alice->John: Hello John, how are you? loop Healthcheck John->John: Fight against hypochondria end Note right of John: Rational thoughts
prevail... John-->Alice: Great! John->Bob: How about you? Bob-->John: Jolly good!

An example Gantt diagram:

```mermaid
gantt
  dateFormat  YYYY-MM-DD
  section Section
  A task           :a1, 2014-01-01, 30d
  Another task     :after a1  , 20d
  section Another
  Task in sec      :2014-01-12  , 12d
  another task      : 24d
```

renders as

gantt dateFormat YYYY-MM-DD section Section A task :a1, 2014-01-01, 30d Another task :after a1 , 20d section Another Task in sec :2014-01-12 , 12d another task : 24d

Advanced diagrams

More advanced diagrams can be created in the open source draw.io editor. The editor has support for almost any type of diagram, from simple to complex. A diagram can be easily embedded in Wowchemy by choosing File > Embed > SVG in the draw.io editor and pasting the generated code into your page.

Alternatively, a diagram can be exported as an image from any drawing software, or a document/slide containing a diagram can be embedded.

Code highlighting

Pass the language of the code, such as python, as a parameter after three backticks:

```python
# Example of code highlighting
input_string_var = input("Enter some data: ")
print("You entered: {}".format(input_string_var))
```

Result:

# Example of code highlighting
input_string_var = input("Enter some data: ")
print("You entered: {}".format(input_string_var))

You can also customize the highlighter theme.

Jupyter Notebook

View the guide to blogging with Jupyter Notebooks.

GitHub gist

{{< gist USERNAME GIST-ID  >}}

Math

Wowchemy supports a Markdown extension for $\LaTeX$ math. You can enable this feature by toggling the math option in your config/_default/params.yaml file.

To render inline or block math, wrap your LaTeX math with {{< math >}}$...${{< /math >}} or {{< math >}}$$...$${{< /math >}}, respectively. (We wrap the LaTeX math in the Wowchemy math shortcode to prevent Hugo rendering our math as Markdown. The math shortcode is new in v5.5.)

Example math block:

{{< math >}}
$$
\gamma_{n} = \frac{ \left | \left (\mathbf x_{n} - \mathbf x_{n-1} \right )^T \left [\nabla F (\mathbf x_{n}) - \nabla F (\mathbf x_{n-1}) \right ] \right |}{\left \|\nabla F(\mathbf{x}_{n}) - \nabla F(\mathbf{x}_{n-1}) \right \|^2}
$$
{{< /math >}}

renders as

$$\gamma_{n} = \frac{ \left | \left (\mathbf x_{n} - \mathbf x_{n-1} \right )^T \left [\nabla F (\mathbf x_{n}) - \nabla F (\mathbf x_{n-1}) \right ] \right |}{\left \|\nabla F(\mathbf{x}_{n}) - \nabla F(\mathbf{x}_{n-1}) \right \|^2}$$

Example inline math {{< math >}}$\nabla F(\mathbf{x}_{n})${{< /math >}} renders as $\nabla F(\mathbf{x}_{n})$.

Example multi-line math using the math linebreak (\\):

{{< math >}}
$$f(k;p_{0}^{*}) = \begin{cases}p_{0}^{*} & \text{if }k=1, \\
1-p_{0}^{*} & \text{if }k=0.\end{cases}$$
{{< /math >}}

renders as

$$f(k;p_{0}^{*}) = \begin{cases}p_{0}^{*} & \text{if }k=1, \\ 1-p_{0}^{*} & \text{if }k=0.\end{cases}$$

Math in front matter

Math is primarily intended for use within the page body, but can also be added to page front matter variables such as a publication abstract with some additional checks.

As Hugo and Wowchemy can attempt to parse YAML, Markdown, and LaTeX content in the front matter, Markdown special characters need to be escaped in any math within the front matter fields by using a backslash to prevent the math being parsed as Markdown. The following tips may help:

  • escape each LaTeX backslash (\) with an extra backslash, yielding \\
  • escape each LaTeX underscore (_) with two backslashes, yielding \\_

Hence, abstract: "${O(d_{\max})}$" becomes abstract: "${O(d\\_{\\max})}$".

Subscripts & superscripts

Subscripts and superscripts can be written direct from a (unicode) keyboard or pasted from a reference.

Alternatively, you can enable math in params.yaml and use the Latex notation, for example $^2$.

Tables

Markdown Table

For quick, simple tables, use the Markdown table generator and paste the resulting Markdown into your page.

CSV Table

For larger tables, save your spreadsheet as a CSV file in your page’s folder and then render it by adding the Table shortcode to your page:

{{< table path="results.csv" header="true" caption="Table 1: My results" >}}

Google Sheets

See the Embed Documents section.

  1. Footnote example. ↩︎

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Last updated on Aug 21, 2022

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