rdoc2md

https://github.com/kirkbowers/rdoc2md

rdoc2md is a utility for converting Rdoc style documents into markdown. The primary motivation is to make a Hoe gem project more github friendly. Hoe depends on a README.txt file in Rdoc format. Github expects a README.md file to display nicely on the webpage. This utility lets you make the .txt file the master and autogenerate the .md version without Repeating Yourself.

Incidentally, if you are reading this on github, this README was produced by rdoc2md. Kinda meta, eh?

To use rdoc2md, first install it:

[sudo] gem install rdoc2md

Most likely you will want to run it on the command line, like so:

rdoc2md README.txt > README.md

You can use it inside of a Ruby program by passing a String to the initializer of the Rdoc2md::Document object and calling to_md:

require 'rdoc2md'

result = Rdoc2md::Document.new(text).to_md

I tried for the life of me to make it work as a Hoe plugin, but no luck. That may be a future feature. In the meantime, add require 'rdoc2md' near the top of your Rakefile and add this near the bottom:

task :readme do
  readme = File.open("README.txt").read
  File.open('README.md', 'w') do |file| 
    file.write(Rdoc2md::Document.new(readme).to_md)
  end
end

This will allow you to run rake readme before you commit to github and generate a markdown version of your README.

rdoc2md does not depend on any other gem in order to run.

It does, however, depend on by hoe and shoulda for development and testing.

After checking out the source, run:

rake newb

This task will install any missing dependencies, run the tests/specs, and generate the RDoc.

This first pass is very ad-hoc. I make no claims that it exhaustively covers all situations where Rdoc could be converted to an equivalent markdown notation. If you find a shortcoming, by all means, feel free to upgrade it. I welcome all contributions.

I do prefer that such shortcomings be documented first in the Issues. I may be working on a fix already. No sense in two people fixing the same thing....

rdoc2md is released under the MIT license.