Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

HackMD VS Markdown by DaringFireball

Compare HackMD VS Markdown by DaringFireball and see what are their differences

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HackMD logo HackMD

Fast and flexible, real-time collaborative markdown, inspired by Hackpad.

Markdown by DaringFireball logo Markdown by DaringFireball

Text-to-HTML conversion tool/syntax for web writers, by John Gruber
  • HackMD Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-08-04
  • Markdown by DaringFireball Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-08-02

HackMD features and specs

  • Collaboration
    HackMD offers real-time collaborative editing, which allows multiple users to work on the same document simultaneously. This feature enhances teamwork and productivity, especially for remote teams.
  • Markdown Support
    HackMD is built around Markdown, providing a simple yet powerful syntax for formatting documents. Markdown compatibility makes it easy to create well-structured content with minimal effort.
  • Version Control
    The platform includes version history, allowing users to track changes, revert to previous versions, and compare different iterations. This feature ensures that work is not lost and can be systematically reviewed.
  • Integration
    HackMD integrates with popular platforms like GitHub, GitLab, and Dropbox, allowing for seamless workflow integration. This makes it easy to incorporate HackMD into existing development and project management processes.
  • Accessibility
    HackMD is a web-based tool, meaning it can be accessed from any device with an internet connection. This ensures that users can collaborate and edit documents from different locations and devices.

Possible disadvantages of HackMD

  • Limited Offline Support
    Since HackMD is primarily a web-based tool, it offers limited functionalities when offline. Users may face challenges accessing and editing documents without an internet connection.
  • Subscription Model
    While HackMD offers a free tier, advanced features and greater collaboration capacities are locked behind a subscription model. This could be a disadvantage for users and small teams with limited budgets.
  • Learning Curve
    Users unfamiliar with Markdown or collaborative editing tools may have a learning curve to overcome. This could affect initial productivity and user experience.
  • Data Privacy
    As a cloud-based service, users may have concerns about data privacy and security. Sensitive information stored on the platform could potentially be accessed by third parties or become vulnerable to data breaches.
  • Performance Issues
    Under heavy usage or with large documents, some users might experience occasional performance issues such as lag or slow syncing. This can disrupt the workflow and collaborative efforts.

Markdown by DaringFireball features and specs

  • Simplicity
    Markdown is designed to be lightweight and easy to write. The syntax is intuitive and resembles plain text formatting, which makes it accessible to both technical and non-technical users.
  • Readability
    Because it is plain text, Markdown is inherently human-readable even without rendering. This makes it easier for people to collaborate on documents without the need for complex tools.
  • Portability
    Markdown files are plain text, making them highly portable. They can be opened, edited, and shared across different operating systems and platforms without compatibility issues.
  • Integrations
    Markdown is widely supported and integrated across various platforms, including GitHub, Bitbucket, and Jekyll, as well as a variety of text editors and blogging tools. This allows for seamless workflow integration.
  • Version Control
    Due to its plain text nature, Markdown works exceptionally well with version control systems like Git. This makes tracking changes, merging, and diffs straightforward.

Possible disadvantages of Markdown by DaringFireball

  • Limited Formatting
    Markdown does not support all possible formatting options. Complex layouts and advanced styling, which are easily achievable in HTML or Word processors, can be difficult or impossible to implement.
  • Inconsistent Implementations
    There are many variations and extensions of Markdown, which can lead to inconsistencies in how Markdown files are rendered by different tools and platforms. This can cause compatibility issues.
  • Learning Curve for Advanced Features
    While the basic syntax is simple, more advanced features like tables, footnotes, or embedded HTML may require additional learning and do not always have a consistent syntax across implementations.
  • Dependency on Rendering Tools
    Markdown needs to be processed and rendered into other formats (e.g., HTML) to be useful in many contexts. This means users often depend on specific tools or services to visualize their Markdown content.
  • Lack of Standardization
    Without a formal standard, Markdown can vary in implementation from one parser to another. This lack of standardization can lead to issues with document portability and consistency.

Analysis of HackMD

Overall verdict

  • Overall, HackMD is a strong choice for those looking for an effective and flexible markdown editor with robust collaboration features. Its convenience, ease of use, and extensive features make it a good option for both personal and professional use.

Why this product is good

  • HackMD is popular because it offers a collaborative markdown editing environment that's particularly useful for teams and individuals who need to work on documentation, notes, or any kind of markdown-based content. It allows real-time collaboration, version control, and easy sharing, making it ideal for productivity. Its interface is user-friendly, and it supports a variety of integrations with tools like GitHub, Google Drive, and Dropbox. This flexibility and the ability to seamlessly work across different platforms make HackMD a valuable tool for many users.

Recommended for

  • Teams needing real-time collaboration on documents
  • Developers working on project documentation
  • Educators and students for note-taking and sharing
  • Writers preferring markdown for content creation
  • Anyone looking for a cloud-based markdown editor with integrations

HackMD videos

hackmd.io opensource application review

More videos:

  • Demo - Techstars Paris 2018 Demo Day - HackMD pitch
  • Review - Screencast-Tutorial zu HackMD

Markdown by DaringFireball videos

No Markdown by DaringFireball videos yet. You could help us improve this page by suggesting one.

Add video

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to HackMD and Markdown by DaringFireball)
Task Management
100 100%
0% 0
Markdown Editor
0 0%
100% 100
Productivity
100 100%
0% 0
Text Editors
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

Share your experience with using HackMD and Markdown by DaringFireball. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
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Social recommendations and mentions

Markdown by DaringFireball might be a bit more popular than HackMD. We know about 88 links to it since March 2021 and only 66 links to HackMD. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

HackMD mentions (66)

  • If it is worth keeping, save it in Markdown
    HackMD already does this. It has a dual-pane view for raw markdown and formatted output, supports WYSIWYG editing, and allows real-time collaboration. Surprised no one mentioned it. - [HackMD: Your Collaborative Markdown Workspace for Knowledge Sharing](https://hackmd.io/). - Source: Hacker News / 3 months ago
  • TL;DR of Deep Dive into LLMs Like ChatGPT by Andrej Karpathy
    [2]: https://hackmd.io/@opensourceinitiative/osaid-faq#What-is-the-role-of-training-data-in-the-Open-Source-AI-Definition. - Source: Hacker News / 4 months ago
  • Web scraping with GPT-4o: powerful but expensive
    About this document ===== [0] https://hackmd.io/@sparna/semantic-markdown-draft. - Source: Hacker News / 9 months ago
  • Tor: From the Dark Web to the Future of Privacy
    It seems, at the beginning of the 90s there were a lot of expectations in regard to DC-nets, considered to be a way better alternative to remailers of the time [1]. At least that's my impression after reading Tim May's FAQ (The Cyphernomicon) [2]. Any progress on this front? [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_remailer [2]: https://hackmd.io/@jmsjsph/TheCyphernomicon. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
  • Meta Llama 3
    Actually right now the OSI is hosting ongoing discussion this year on what it means for AI to be open source. Here is their latest blog post on the subject: https://opensource.org/blog/open-source-ai-definition-weekly-update-april-15 Here is the latest draft: https://hackmd.io/@opensourceinitiative/osaid-0-0-7 And a discussion about the draft:... - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
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Markdown by DaringFireball mentions (88)

  • Building PicoSSG: 'Just Enough Code'
    ADR-001 explored different approaches to handling mixed Markdown and Nunjucks content, ultimately selecting front-matter as the simplest approach that maintained compatibility with other tools. - Source: dev.to / 13 days ago
  • How To Build and Host a Gatsby Blog
    Markdown is a common syntax for writing that is easily converted into HTML. You can read more about markdown from its creator here. Each blog post file you put in this blog folder will be converted to HTML and rendered on your site. Right now, there are three posts in the folder. Delete two of them and keep one (doesn’t matter which you pick). It should be noted that Gatsby expects each blog post to be represented... - Source: dev.to / 4 months ago
  • Add content to your site: Markdown 📝
    Markdown allows you to write using an easy-to-read, easy-to-write plain text format and Astro includes built-in support for Markdown files. In this way you can build your personal blog and any other kinds of projects. In this article we will go to see the features 🎊 Let's start! 🤙. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • TextBundle
    But what does "net.daringfireball.markdown" mean? Does it mean "parse it using the 1.0.1 Perl script from 2004 on https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/ "? - Source: Hacker News / 9 months ago
  • TextBundle
    Something that isn’t clear to me from this spec http://textbundle.org/spec/ is the exact format of Markdown that should be used here. I was under the impression that the Gruber original at https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/ wasn’t well enough specified (unless you want to treat a 20 year old Perl script as a specification) to be interoperable - hence efforts like https://commonmark.org/. - Source: Hacker News / 9 months ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing HackMD and Markdown by DaringFireball, you can also consider the following products

Boardist - Personal workspace for all the data

Typora - A minimal Markdown reading & writing app.

ReadTheDocs - Spend your time on writing high quality documentation, not on the tools to make your documentation work.

StackEdit - Full-featured, open-source Markdown editor based on PageDown, the Markdown library used by Stack Overflow and the other Stack Exchange sites.

Documize - Enterprise-grade wiki and knowledge management platform

MarkdownPad - MarkdownPad is a full-featured Markdown editor for Windows. Features: