One feature of Typora that I don’t find from other markdown editor is that it allows users to create customized export functions. With this feature, one can turn Typora into a simple IDE for creating documents using the full power of Pandoc or websites using Hugo.
Creating documents using Pandoc with --defaults=FILE.yaml
Starting from version 2.8, Pandoc can read options that stored in a yaml file. To do so, add the option -d FILE or --defaults=FILE in a Pandoc calling sequence. See the pandoc manual Default Files for more information.
Using the defaults option, one convert a markdown file to many types of output files by the same command pandoc -d FILE input.md -o output.*.
In Typora, the user can create a customized exporting function as follows.
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Find and open the export setting dialog.
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Click the “add (+)” button in the list panel.
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Select Custom from the dialog.
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Fill in the Command box with a command
pandoc -d defaults ${currentPath}
Building Website in Typora with Hugo
Typora allows the user to open a folder and register the folder path. If the folder of a Hugo website is opened in Typora, the user can create two customized export functions to preview and build the website.
Export as Hugo preview
Similar to the Pandoc export function as above, the user can create a customized exporting function with the following command for Hugo preview.
start http:\\localhost:1313\ | hugo server
Export as Hugo build
For an export function of Hugo build, the command is simply.
hugo
Note that the path of Hugo should be added to the system environment so that it can be called without specifying the path.
Customized export functions for other commands
In similar ways, one can create other export functions for various purpose.
For example, to open the CMD in Windows, the command is start cmd. To open the terminal in MacOS, the command is open terminal.