Zim - a desktop wiki

Autoformat

Auto-formatting means that zim parses text while you type. Be aware that the syntax for auto-formatting isn't the same as the wiki syntax for the source formatting (the wiki format as it is saved to the files). If you typed in source syntax and you want to have it rendered you should reload the page (press ^R).

If autoformatting does something you didn't intend you can reverse it by pressing <ctrl>Z.

Headings

Typing:

= Heading 1 <ENTER>

gives you a heading 1 and typing:

== Heading 2<ENTER>

gives you a heading 2. But in the corresponding text file these headings are marked as follows:

====== Heading 1 ======
===== Heading 2 =====

Links

When you type a word in "CamelCase" it will be considered a link. Once again this autoformatting is done by the editor, your source format does not have to support CamelCase.

This feature can be turned off in the Preferences dialog.

Also when you type a internet url like http://perl.org it will automatically be identified as a link.

Bullets and Checkboxes

Another example of auto-formatting is that "* " at the beginning of a line gets converted to a bullet automatically. Typing either "[ ] ", "[*] " or "[x] " will give your different kinds of checkboxes.

Special characters

You can type special characters using their HTML entity names. For example to insert a "λ" one can type "\lambda ". Again this is not the wiki syntax as it is saved, it is just a short-cut to insert characters you do not have on your keyboard. A list with available characters can be found here.

Also you can use the same syntax to insert a character by its character number, so typing "\955 " will also insert a "λ".