Beyond Markdown

[xplosionmind]

Differentiating <em> and <i>

I do not know if this is the right place to write this, in case it is OT I can create a new post from scratch.

In HTML, there is a relevant difference in the use of <i> and <em>. Differentiating the two tags in Markdown could be very simple:

• _ should only be parsed as <i>
• * should only be parsed as <em>

[Crissov]

I explored that idea in this brief thread:

Em/strong vs. i/b or cite/dfn etc

Most documentation and GUI toolbar icons imply that the markup generated from _, *, __ and ** ist italics and boldface when it really is <em> and <strong> in HTML, which were intended as semantic elements for their presentational counterparts <i> and <b>. Sometimes, emphasis is represented differently, e.g. by colors, small capitals, underlines, letter spacing or typeface changes. There are other phrases that are presented in italic or bold type according to traditional Western typography – for…

I think it has also been mentioned elsewhere.