Markdown to convert double asterisks to bold text in javascript
javascript, jquery, markdown, wysiwym
Solution
Your regex is broken, for one thing. You probably want something more like:
/\*\*[A-z0-9]+\*\*/gi
The `*` is a special character in regular expressions. If you want to match against a literal `*`, then you need to escape it with `\`.
For instance: http://jsfiddle.net/2LAL4/22/
However, even with this change there's still a fair ways to go before you get to where you really want to be. For instance, your example will not work if the text area contains a mix of bold and non-bold text.
Problem
i'm trying to make my own markdown-able textarea like Stackoverflow has done. The goal is to allow people to type `**blah blah**` in a textarea and have the output in a div be `<span style="font-weight:bold;">blah blah</span>`. I'm having trouble with the javascript to find and replace to the **asterisks with the HTML. here's a jsfiddle which has gotten the party started: http://jsfiddle.net/trpeters1/2LAL4/14/ here's the JS on that just to show you where I'm at: ``` $(document.body).on('click', 'button', function() { var val=$('textarea').val(); var bolded=val.replace(/\**[A-z][0-9]**/gi, '<span style="font-weight:bold;">"'+val+'" </span>'); $('div').html(bolded); }); ``` and the HTML... ``` <textarea></textarea> <div></div><button type="button">Markdownify</button> ``` any thoughts would be greatly appreciated! thanks, tim