Backticks Parsing in Strings

The Challenge

Parsing Markdown backticks in a text can be complex. Many Markdown parsers are large and handle various functionalities beyond simple backtick parsing. This overcomplication can be an issue when you need a lightweight solution for parsing only inline and block code wrapped in backticks.

The Solution: backticks-codeblocks

To address this, I developed backticks-codeblocks, a minimal JavaScript library focusing solely on parsing backticks in Markdown text. This library identifies and separates inline code (surrounded by single backticks) and block code (enclosed in triple backticks) from the rest of the text.

How It Works

The library processes a text string and returns an array of segments. Each segment is either a string (regular text) or an object representing a code snippet. The object includes the code content and a boolean flag indicating if it's block code.

Usage Example

import { processText } from 'backticks-codeblocks';

const markdown = 'Some `inline code` and a block:\n```

\nconsole.log("Hello, world!");\n

```';
const segments = processText(markdown);

// segments output:
// [
//   "Some ",
//   { code: "inline code", isBlock: false },
//   " and a block:\n",
//   { code: 'console.log("Hello, world!");', isBlock: true }
// ]

Why backticks-codeblocks?

Lightweight: It focuses only on backticks parsing, making it much smaller than full-fledged Markdown parsers.
Simple: Easy to use with a straightforward approach.
Flexible: Useful when only backtick parsing is required without the overhead of full Markdown parsing.

Open for Contributions

The library is open-source, and I welcome contributions. Whether it's suggesting features, reporting issues, or improving the code, your input is valuable.

backticks-codeblocks is a modest effort to simplify a specific aspect of Markdown parsing. I hope you find it useful for your projects.