Lists

drondrond Bold, italics, links, pre can be embedded in lists. Whitespace is optional before and after the - or # character. Also see lists reasoning for creole's decisions.

Unordered Lists#

These lists are usually also refered to as bullet lists, however this term is misleading because with css you can format it as bold dashes as well...

Creole:

* Item 1
* Item 2

Recommended HTML:

<ul>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2</li>
</ul>

Output:

• Item 1
• Item 2

WikiMatrix unordered list syntax comparison

Ordered Lists#

# Item 1
# Item 2

Recommended HTML:

<ol>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2</li>
</ol>

Output:

1. Item 1
2. Item 2

Nesting#

Lists can be nested:

Creole:

* Item 1
* Item 2
** Item 2.1
** Item 2.2

Recommended HTML:

<ul>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2
  <ul>
  <li>Item 2.1</li>
  <li>Item 2.2</li>
  </ul>
</li>
</ul>

Output:

• Item 1
• Item 2
  • Item 2.1
  • Item 2.2

Mixing#

Nested lists can be mixed by repeating the list item character multiple times:

Creole:

* Item 1
* Item 2
## Item 2.1
## Item 2.2

Recommended HTML:

<ul>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2
  <ol>
  <li>Item 2.1</li>
  <li>Item 2.2</li>
  </ol>
</li>
</ul>

Output:

• Item 1
• Item 2
  1. Item 2.1
  2. Item 2.2

Leading Whitespace#

People like Alex argued against allowing leading whitespace, citing the markup for Headings as a counter example. People like Christoph, Alain and Radomir however reported that users will indent lists. The output then confuses non-technical people and requires a certain amount of handholding.

Note that leading whitespace has no effect on the nesting of the list item. The number list item character repetitions determines the nesting level.

Creole:

  * Item 1
  * Item 2
    **  Item 2.1
     ** Item 2.2

Recommended HTML:

<ul>
<li>Item 1</li>
<li>Item 2
  <ul>
  <li>Item 2.1</li>
  <li>Item 2.2</li>
  </ul>
</li>
</ul>

Output:

• Item 1
• Item 2
  • Item 2.1
  • Item 2.2

WikiMatrix#

WikiMatrix ordered list syntax comparison

Also see: All Markup

Related #

• MultilineListItems and Talk.MultilineListItems
• List Markup Alternatives and Talk.ListMarkupAlternatives
• Bullet List
• List Markup Decision and Talk.ListMarkupDecision
• Bullet List On Wikipedia Research
• Hyphen List Markup Proposal and Talk.HyphenListMarkupProposal
• Engines Using Asterisks For Lists And Bold
• Require Space After Bullet Proposal and Talk.RequireSpaceAfterBulletProposal
• Lists Reasoning
• ListsAndHorizontalLinesSignaturesAmbiguity
• Edge Cases
• Bold And Lists Ambiguity