Format description
The format that I use internally to create this site is my own creation, but based on existing formats like POD and WikiWiki. The square bracket linking is stolen from the PerlMonks website
Paragraphs
Paragraphs are split by blank lines, that may or may not contain whitespace.
Paragraph tags
Paragraphs may start with tag: , in which case the default tag p is not used. Paragraph tags should correspond to appropriate HTML block level tags.
Special paragraph tag html
A paragraph with a tag of html will be included literally in the HTML document. This makes adding HTML forms a lot easier.
Special paragraph tag perl
Special paragraph tag perl executes a block of Perl in its own lexical scope. If the returned value is an array reference, the elements are parsed as paragraphs, other return values are discarded. Use of print is useless, assign to a variable instead.
Special paragraph identifier *
Paragraphs that start with *, with no whitespace in front of it, are unordered lists, and will have each line that starts with * behave as if the inline tag li was used. This sets the paragraph tag to ul and cannot be used together with an explicit paragraph tag.
Special paragraph identifier #
Paragraphs that start with #, with no whitespace in front of it, are ignored. Note that the entire paragraph will not be used.
Special paragraph --
A paragraph containing only two or more - characters is interpreted as a horizontal line.
Inline tags
Inline tags are specified as {tag:content}, where tag should be an HTML block or inline level tag. The curly brackets do nest and the content is parsed, making {b:{i:bold and italic {u:and underlined}}} possible.
Special inline tag html
Special inline tag html outputs content in {tag:content} without further parsing. This allows for JavaScript to be included.
Special inline tag perl
Special inline tag perl evaluates a Perl expression in scalar context in its own lexcial scope. The returned value is interpolated.
Links
Links may be specified as [page] or [page|alternative text]. The square brackets do not nest. Internal links and links in exlinx.pl are \w+. All other links are considered to be external. External links get target=_blank.
Escape character \
\ may be used to escape special characters like [, * and #. \{ renders as {, while a bare { would possibly introduce an inline tag. The escape character itself may also be escaped. Never has escaping a character a special meaning (\n renders as n, not linebreak).