This filter program generates a Table of Contents (TOC) from Markdown files. Written in C with standard libraries, making it light, fast and highly portable across various systems.

Clone the repo:

git clone https://github.com/xuminic/markdown-toc-c

Build the program:

make

• filtering from pipe:

  cat README.md | md-toc
  

  The TOC will be printed out in the console.

• read from files:

  md-toc README.md
  

  The TOC will be printed out in the console.

• overwrite the TOC in the markdown files:

  Before doing so, you need to add a pair of place mark to let md-toc know where to place the TOC. The place marks are HTML comments so they would be hidden from displaying.

  <!--toc-->
  <!--toc-->
  

  This README.md can be the example of where to set the place marks. Then using -o option to replace the old TOC:

  md-toc -o README1.md README2.md README3.md
  

  md-toc can batch process the markdown files. Each file would be updated with the new TOC.

  If there's no <!--toc--> mark in the markdown file, the TOC will be saved at the beginning of the file.

• -o aka --overwrite: update the markdown file with the TOC.
• -s aka --show: show the markdown file with TOC in console, no overwrite.

Without option, the md-toc will show only the TOC part in the console, not the TOC with the input file.