Pandoc is a command-line tool for converting from one markup format to another: Markdown, HTML, LaTeX, DOCX, etc.

Table of Contents

Installation

pandoc is likely installed on your system, but if it’s not, you can easily install it with your operating system’s package manager.

Basic usage

Pandoc syntax is simple:

pandoc [<options>] <input file>
  • If no input files are specified, pandoc reads from standard input (‘stdin’).
  • Output goes to stdout by default.
  • Format of the input and output files are guessed based on files’ extensions, unless explicitly specified.

Options

  • -o <file>: specify an output file.
  • -f <format>: specify a format for the input file.
  • -t <format>: specify a format for the output file.
  • -s: produce a ‘standalone’ document (e.g.: a valid HTML file with the <head> and <body> tags) instead of a document fragment.

Run pandoc --list-input-formats and pandoc --list-output-formats to print a list of supported formats.

Examples

You can do a lot of markup and file conversions with pandoc. Check its man page for more info (man pandoc). These are some examples with Markdown:

Markdown to HTML

pandoc -s -o output.html markdown.md

HTML to Markdown

pandoc -o web.md index.html

Markdown to manual page

  • Check the result before saving 
    pandoc -s -t man mycommand.md | man -l -
  • Save the manpage 
    pandoc -s -t man mycommand.md -o mycommand

Markdown file must follow this syntax:

% COMMAND(1)
% John Doe
% January 2023

# NAME

command - my new command

# SYNOPSIS

`command [-t <type>] <file>`

# DESCRIPTION

My awesome command can do a lot of things.

# OPTIONS

`-t <type>` : specify a type

Markdown to PDF

pandoc -o output.pdf markdown.md
  • Pandoc cannot convert from PDF to other format.

More

Convert between CSV-JSON, TXT-ODT/DOCX, Markdown-EPUB, HTML-PDF and much more, with the same syntax. Check pandoc manual page and the website (https://pandoc.org/).

If you have any suggestion, feel free to contact me via social media or email.