5. Markup

Markup within reStructuredText documents tells the ReST parser when to do something special in the document. reStructuredText markup can be divided up into 2 categories:

• implicit: when text formatting is interpreted by the ReST parser and is a natural part of the document’s structure, such as section headings, bullet lists, and word- or phrase-emphasis. The markup used is meant to be as minimal and unobtrusive as possible.

• explicit: is when the markup is an actual command to the ReST parser. It begins with 2 periods and a space (“.. “) as the first non-whitespace characters on a line, and is followed by a recognized markup command followed by 2 colons. And what then follows it depends on the markup command. Example:

  .. code::
  
      code block here, relayed verbatim by the ReST parser.