How to use Markdown to edit Blogger posts

Use Markdown to edit a Blogger post.

• Basic structure
• Insert a YAML front matter
  • About tags
  • Insert a jump break
  • Insert a table of contents
• Add an image
• Synchronization
  • Export to Dropbox
  • Export to Google Drive
• Publication
  • Publish on Blogger
  • Don’t miss the postId
• See also

Everything is possible thanks to Stackedit that is the definitive Markdown editor!

Well, right now, that is exactly the method I’m using to edit this post.

So this post contains information about how to edit other posts, so it is meta, and in particular itself, so it is auto.

Ergo this is an auto meta post … mmh

Basic structure

An empty article looks like this

---
title: Title
tags:
  - Tag
---

Short description

<!--more-->

[TOC]

Content

Insert a YAML front matter

Add YAML at the beginning of the article, something like this

---
title: How to use Markdown to edit Blogger posts
tags:
  - Blogger
  - Markdown
---

About tags

Insert at least one entry in the tags array. It will be used by Blogspot to label the article.
I consider the first entry as a cathegory, choose the right one and be consistent.

Insert a jump break

First of all, I add a first introduction an then a jump break with this code

<!--more-->

Insert a table of contents

It is really easy, just add [TOC] and Stackedit will generate a table of contents.

I use to add it just after the jump break. A great benefit is that every section will gain an internal link, that is very useful if you want to point an anchor to a specific section of your article.

Add an image

I like to add at least one image for every article, whenever it makes sense. There is an add image icon on menu bar that let you select images from an url or from Picasa where I have an album containing the images of my blog.

Synchronization

OPTIONAL

This is not necessary, but I think it is useful to backup your articles in Markdown format.

Export to Dropbox

You can start using Dropbox, in order to be able to import an article from any computer. It will be synced every few minutes.

Export to Google Drive

Also Google Drive is an available choice. I use both and they work great!
It is worth to keep track of the fileId, I use to annotate it in the YAML front matter. This is useful to avoid duplicated documents: it is the same idea I apply to the postId, see below.

You can copy the fileId from the Manage synchronization menu entry.

Another useful tip is to store all the articles in the same folder. Just navigate to your target folfder and get the folderId from the Google Drive url that has the following form

https://drive.google.com/#folders/<YOUR_FOLDER_ID >

The folderId and fileId are useful information to use on the Export to Google Drive modal dialog: click on Options… to see the related input fields.

Publication

Publish on Blogger

Go to the top left button menu, in the Publish on… section

Don’t miss the postId

After publication, the article get assigned a postId so you will be able to use the Update document publication button.

If you are using synchronization feature, it is worth to annotate the postId in the YAML.

You can copy the postId entering the Manage publication menu section, so YAML will looking something like this.

---
title: How to use Markdown to edit Blogger posts
tags:
  - Blogger
  - Markdown
postId: 1766129362942319202
---

See also

Blogger style tips