Usage: markdown-toc [--json] [-i] <input>
input: The markdown file to parse for table of contents,
or "-" to read from stdin.
--json: Print the TOC in json format
-i: Edit the <input> file directly, injecting the TOC at <!!-- toc -->
(Without this flag, the default is to print the TOC to stdout.)
Features
- Can optionally be used as a [remarkable][] plugin
- Returns an object with the rendered TOC (on
content
), as well as ajson
property with the raw TOC object, so you can generate your own TOC using templates or however you want - Works with repeated headings
- Uses sane defaults, so no customization is necessary, but you can if you need to.
- filter out headings you don't want
- Improve the headings you do want
- Use a custom slugify function to change how links are created
Safe!
- Won't mangle markdown in code examples in gfm code blocks that other TOC generators mistake as being actual headings (this happens when markdown headings are show in examples, meaning they arent' actually headings that should be in the toc. Also happens with yaml and coffee-script comments, or any comments that use
#
) - Won't mangle front-matter, or mistake front-matter properties for headings like other TOC generators
var toc = require('{%= name %}');
toc('# One\n\n# Two').content;
// Results in:
// - [One](#one)
// - [Two](#two)
To allow customization of the output, an object is returned with the following properties:
content
{String}: The generated table of contents. Unless you want to customize rendering, this is all you need.highest
{Number}: The highest level heading found. This is used to adjust indentation.tokens
{Array}: Headings tokens that can be used for custom rendering
Use as a [remarkable][] plugin.
var Remarkable = require('remarkable');
var toc = require('markdown-toc');
function render(str, options) {
return new Remarkable()
.use(toc.plugin(options)) // <= register the plugin
.render(str);
}
Usage example
var results = render('# AAA\n# BBB\n# CCC\nfoo\nbar\nbaz');
Results in:
- [AAA](#aaa)
- [BBB](#bbb)
- [CCC](#ccc)
Object for creating a custom TOC.
toc('# AAA\n## BBB\n### CCC\nfoo').json;
// results in
[ { content: 'AAA', slug: 'aaa', lvl: 1 },
{ content: 'BBB', slug: 'bbb', lvl: 2 },
{ content: 'CCC', slug: 'ccc', lvl: 3 } ]
Insert a table of contents immediately after an opening <!!-- toc -->
code comment, or replace an existing TOC if both an opening comment and a closing comment (<!!-- tocstop -->
) are found.
(This strategy works well since code comments in markdown are hidden when viewed as HTML, like when viewing a README on GitHub README for example).
Example
<!!-- toc -->
- old toc 1
- old toc 2
- old toc 3
<!!-- tocstop -->
## abc
This is a b c.
## xyz
This is x y z.
Would result in something like:
<!!-- toc -->
- [abc](#abc)
- [xyz](#xyz)
<!!-- tocstop -->
## abc
This is a b c.
## xyz
This is x y z.
As a convenience to folks who wants to create a custom TOC, markdown-toc's internal utility methods are exposed:
var toc = require('markdown-toc');
toc.bullets()
: render a bullet list from an array of tokenstoc.linkify()
: linking a headingcontent
stringtoc.slugify()
: slugify a headingcontent
stringtoc.strip()
: strip words or characters from a headingcontent
string
Example
var result = toc('# AAA\n## BBB\n### CCC\nfoo');
var str = '';
result.json.forEach(function(heading) {
str += toc.linkify(heading.content);
});
Append a string to the end of the TOC.
toc(str, {append: '\n_(TOC generated by Verb)_'});
Type: Function
Default: undefined
Params:
str
{String} the actual heading stringele
{Objecct} object of heading tokensarr
{Array} all of the headings objects
Example
From time to time, we might get junk like this in our TOC.
[.aaa([foo], ...) another bad heading](#-aaa--foo--------another-bad-heading)
Unless you like that kind of thing, you might want to filter these bad headings out.
function removeJunk(str, ele, arr) {
return str.indexOf('...') === -1;
}
var result = toc(str, {filter: removeJunk});
//=> beautiful TOC
Type: Function
Default: Basic non-word character replacement.
Example
var str = toc('# Some Article', {slugify: require('uslug')});
Type: String|Array
Default: *
The bullet to use for each item in the generated TOC. If passed as an array (['*', '-', '+']
), the bullet point strings will be used based on the header depth.
Type: Number
Default: 6
Use headings whose depth is at most maxdepth.
Type: Boolean
Default: true
Exclude the first h1-level heading in a file. For example, this prevents the first heading in a README from showing up in the TOC.