Formatting articles for apps: Markdown to the rescue

This week, our startup updated the official guide to the International Eucharistic Congress 2016 that will be held in Cebu this January. The update contained new information including the complete schedule, profile of speakers as well as a News sub-section that will contain updates leading to and during the actual event.

Among the new information that went into the update was the basic text of the congress or the “Theological and Pastoral Reflections in Preparation for the 51st International Eucharistic Congress.” It is a lengthy treatise on the Eucharist and the Church’s mission.

The material we had to work on and format for the app was a 53-page PDF document with 154 footnotes.

Stackedit Markdown

MARKING UP WITH MARKDOWN. Using StackEdit to format documents using Markdown for use in our IEC 2016 mobile app.

When we format static articles for inclusion into our apps, we use Markdown. The markup language is so easy to use it speeds up the coding of documents. Before we transitioned to Markdown, we used to manually code documents using HTML and CSS. For shorter articles, this was fine. But it was tedious for longer documents.

With Markdown, it took us less than an hour to prepare the IEC basic text for inclusion into the app. What took time was manually coping the text from the PDF file.

For Markdown formatting, our current tool is Stackedit. The online service offers excellent Markdown syntax support with offline storage as well as options to synchronize with your Dropbox and Google Drive accounts.

While content management systems make it so easy to publish stories and format text, a basic HTML and CSS knowledge will go a long way in giving a journalist an edge professionally. Knowing Markdown will sharpen that edge.

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New #30DayChallenge: Write in Markdown

I’ve always wanted to learn and start using Markdown in writing. For some time, it hovered near the top of my to-do list but I never got around to actually starting to use it.

I use a Markdown-capable online writing tool – Editorially – but I never used it for that. I used it purely to manage articles and to allow me to work on a post in multiple workstations.

When I write, I compose only in plain text. As soon as I’d finish the article, I’d go over the post again and manually code the HTML tags for blog or website publishing.

Markdown, a “lightweight markup language” created by a writer – John Gruber, simplifies that. It allows you to to easily mark up documents and export these into structurally valid HTML.

I’ve always filed using Markdown as one of the tasks I’d do in a future #30DayChallenge.

I finally got around to using it more extensively this month when I became more active in using Github to manage my projects and work files. I fully realized its utility when I started processing the Sun.Star Cebu News Style Guide and uploading it to its repo so that newsroom editors and reporters could start working to update and improve it in preparation for turning it into a mobile app.

MARKDOWN. It took me days to code this dated Sun.Star Cebu Style Guide in HTML. With Markdown, it took me hours. If you do a lot of writing, especially for digital media, Markdown is something you should consider using.

MARKDOWN. It took me days to code this dated Sun.Star Cebu Style Guide in HTML. With Markdown, it took me hours. If you do a lot of writing, especially for digital media, Markdown is something you should consider using.

If you do a lot of writing, especially for digital media, Markdown is something you should consider using.

It took me days to manually code the old version of the Sun.Star Cebu style guide in HTML. With Markdown, it took me hours.

What’s more, Markdown is easy to do – it’s something I can ask other editors and reporters in the newsroom to use in updating our style guide. After introducing them to Git, anyway. But hey, our editor-in-chief now uses Github.

There are many Markdown editors available for free download. On the Mac, my favorite is Mou. On Windows, it’s MarkdownPad. On my Elementary OS Linux desktop, I just use an online Markdown editor like Dillinger or Markable. Here’s an exhaustive list if you want to try out other editors. Here’s the Markdown syntax reference if you’re interested.

As part of my 30-Day Challenge this month, I plan to use Markdown in all my writings and create a workflow that fits my needs.

The post New #30DayChallenge: Write in Markdown appeared first on Leon Kilat : The Tech Experiments.

Parrot is great voice recording app for BlackBerry Z10

Parrot voice record BlackBerry Z10

PARROT ON BLACKBERRY Z10. Parrot is a beautifully-designed app that produces very clear audio recordings. (Photo by Max Limpag)

As a journalist, I use my phone extensively for news gathering. Apart from it being my camera, the phone is also my main voice recorder for interviews. I still carry an MP3 voice recorder but this serves only as backup, the quality of recording in smartphones is so much higher.

Whenever I set up a phone, one of the first apps I install is a voice recorder. On Android, my favorite voice recording application is Easy Voice Recorder, which has a free version that more than meets my needs. On iOS, my favorite voice recording app is iTalk, which produces clear and great quality recordings.

On the BlackBerry Z10, which uses the company’s BlackBerry 10 platform, I find Parrot to be the best voice recording application.

Parrot is easy to use and the user interface is beautiful and minimal. It’s easy to use the app for recording.

I used Parrot in several interviews, including the Tell It To Sun.Star roundtable interview of defeated congressional candidate Annabelle Rama before the elections and the sound quality is really exceptional. Play the clip below to check it out for yourself. My phone was on the table about 2 feet away from Annabelle during the recording.

Parrot on BlackBerry Z10

INTERVIEW. I used Parrot on the BlackBerry Z10 to record the interview by Sun.Star journalists of defeated congressional candidate Annabelle Rama. The recording was very clear. Check out a sample clip below. (Photo by Max Limpag)

Parrot has a live graph of audio input to give you an idea of the sound levels so that you could adjust the placement of the phone.

Listen to this sample clip of the Annabelle Rama interview to check out the quality of Parrot’s recording.

The app is exclusive to the BlackBerry 10 platform.

Parrot also allows you to define the quality of your recording from Low (.awb files), Good (.m4a files) and High (.wav files). You can then copy the recording to the external memory card or share this via Bluetooth, email, BlackBerry Messenger or even NFC.

If you regularly do interviews or record voice memos whenever an idea occurs to you, Parrot on the BlackBerry 10 is an excellent free app for that.

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