quikdown documentation

Complete documentation for the quikdown markdown parser.

📚 Documentation

• Architecture - Parser design, phases, and implementation details
• Security Guide - Security model, XSS prevention, and safe usage
• API Reference - Complete API documentation with examples
• Plugin Development - How to create custom fence plugins
• Framework Integration - Using quikdown with React, Vue, Svelte, Angular
• Bidirectional Conversion - HTML to Markdown round-trip conversion
• AST Libraries - Markdown to AST, JSON, YAML conversion
• Lexer Implementation - Experimental lexer-based parser

🚀 Quick Links

• GitHub Repository
• NPM Package
• Live Examples

📖 Overview

quikdown is a lightweight, secure markdown parser designed for chat and LLM outputs. It prioritizes:

• Security - All HTML is escaped by default
• Size - 9.3KB minified (core), 14.1KB with bidirectional support, zero dependencies
• Extensibility - Plugin system for custom rendering
• Simplicity - Easy to understand and audit
• Bidirectional - Convert HTML back to Markdown for WYSIWYG editing

🎯 Use Cases

• Chat applications
• LLM output rendering
• Comment systems
• Documentation
• Email templates
• Static site generation

💡 Design Philosophy

1. Secure by Default - No XSS vulnerabilities without explicit opt-in
2. Small & Fast - Optimized for size and performance
3. Practical - Focuses on commonly used markdown features
4. Extensible - Plugin system for customization
5. Zero Dependencies - No supply chain risks

🔒 Security First

quikdown escapes all HTML by default. Trusted HTML can only be rendered through explicit fence plugins, making trust granular and intentional.

// Safe for untrusted input
const html = quikdown(userInput);

// Trusted HTML requires explicit plugin
const html = quikdown(markdown, {
  fence_plugin: {
    render: (content, lang) => {
      if (lang === 'trusted-html' && isAdmin()) {
        return content; // Only for trusted sources
      }
    }
  }
});

📦 Installation

npm install quikdown

Or via CDN:

<script src="https://unpkg.com/quikdown/dist/quikdown.umd.min.js"></script>

🌟 Features

Supported Markdown

• Headings (# through ######)
• Bold (**text** or __text__)
• Italic (*text* or _text_)
• Strikethrough (~~text~~)
• Code (` inline and ``blocks` )
• Links ([text](url))
• Images (![alt](url))
• Lists (ordered and unordered with nesting)
• Tables (with alignment)
• Blockquotes (> quote)
• Horizontal rules (---)
• Line breaks (two spaces + newline)

Not Supported (Intentionally)

• Raw HTML passthrough (security)
• Reference-style links (complexity)
• Footnotes (uncommon in chat)
• Definition lists (uncommon)

🔧 Configuration

Options

• inline_styles - Use inline CSS instead of classes
• fence_plugin - Custom code block renderer

Methods

• quikdown(markdown, options) - Parse markdown to HTML
• quikdown.configure(options) - Create configured parser
• quikdown.emitStyles() - Get CSS stylesheet
• quikdown.version - Version string

🤝 Contributing

See Contributing Guide

📄 License

BSD-2-Clause - See LICENSE

🙏 Acknowledgments

• Inspired by the simplicity of early markdown parsers
• Designed for the modern web with security in mind
• Built for real-world chat and LLM use cases