GFM

GFM enables the autolink extension, where autolinks will be recognised in a greater number of conditions.
Autolink (opens new window)s can also be constructed without requiring the use of < and to > to delimit them, although they will be recognized under a smaller set of circumstances. All such recognized autolinks can only come at the beginning of a line, after whitespace, or any of the delimiting characters *, _, ~, and (.
An extended www autolink (opens new window) will be recognized when the text www. is found followed by a valid domain (opens new window). A valid domain (opens new window) consists of alphanumeric characters, underscores (_), hyphens (-) and periods (.). There must be at least one period, and no underscores may be present in the last two segments of the domain.
The scheme http will be inserted automatically:

Example 621

Markdown HTML Demo
 
www.commonmark.org


<p><a href="http://www.commonmark.org">www.commonmark.org</a></p>

After a valid domain (opens new window), zero or more non-space non-< characters may follow:

Example 622

Markdown HTML Demo
 
Visit www.commonmark.org/help for more information.


<p>Visit <a href="http://www.commonmark.org/help">www.commonmark.org/help</a> for more information.</p>

We then apply extended autolink path validation (opens new window) as follows:
Trailing punctuation (specifically, ?, !, ., ,, :, *, _, and ~) will not be considered part of the autolink, though they may be included in the interior of the link:

Example 623

Markdown HTML Demo
 
Visit www.commonmark.org.

Visit www.commonmark.org/a.b.


<p>Visit <a href="http://www.commonmark.org">www.commonmark.org</a>.</p>
<p>Visit <a href="http://www.commonmark.org/a.b">www.commonmark.org/a.b</a>.</p>

When an autolink ends in ), we scan the entire autolink for the total number of parentheses. If there is a greater number of closing parentheses than opening ones, we don’t consider the last character part of the autolink, in order to facilitate including an autolink inside a parenthesis:

Example 624

Markdown HTML Demo
 
www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)

www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)))

(www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business))

(www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)


<p><a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)">www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)">www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)</a>))</p>
<p>(<a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)">www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)</a>)</p>
<p>(<a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)">www.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)</a></p>

This check is only done when the link ends in a closing parentheses ), so if the only parentheses are in the interior of the autolink, no special rules are applied:

Example 625

Markdown HTML Demo
 
www.google.com/search?q=(business))+ok


<p><a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=(business))+ok">www.google.com/search?q=(business))+ok</a></p>

If an autolink ends in a semicolon (;), we check to see if it appears to resemble an entity reference (opens new window); if the preceding text is & followed by one or more alphanumeric characters. If so, it is excluded from the autolink:

Example 626

Markdown HTML Demo
 
www.google.com/search?q=commonmark&hl=en

www.google.com/search?q=commonmark&hl;


<p><a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=commonmark&amp;hl=en">www.google.com/search?q=commonmark&amp;hl=en</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=commonmark">www.google.com/search?q=commonmark</a>&amp;hl;</p>

< immediately ends an autolink.

Example 627

Markdown HTML Demo
 
www.commonmark.org/he<lp


<p><a href="http://www.commonmark.org/he">www.commonmark.org/he</a>&lt;lp</p>

An extended url autolink (opens new window) will be recognised when one of the schemes http://, https://, or ftp://, followed by a valid domain (opens new window), then zero or more non-space non-< characters according to extended autolink path validation (opens new window):

Example 628

Markdown HTML Demo
 
http://commonmark.org

(Visit https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business))


<p><a href="http://commonmark.org">http://commonmark.org</a></p>
<p>(Visit <a href="https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)">https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=Markup+(business)</a>)</p>

An extended email autolink (opens new window) will be recognised when an email address is recognised within any text node. Email addresses are recognised according to the following rules:

  • One ore more characters which are alphanumeric, or ., -, _, or +.
  • An @ symbol.
  • One or more characters which are alphanumeric, or ., -, or _. At least one of the characters here must be a period (.). The last character must not be one of - or _. If the last character is a period (.), it will be excluded from the autolink.

The scheme mailto: will automatically be added to the generated link:

Example 629

Markdown HTML Demo
 
foo@bar.baz


<p><a href="mailto:foo@bar.baz">foo@bar.baz</a></p>

+ can occur before the @, but not after.

Example 630

Markdown HTML Demo
 
hello@mail+xyz.example isn't valid, but hello+xyz@mail.example is.


<p>hello@mail+xyz.example isn't valid, but <a href="mailto:hello+xyz@mail.example">hello+xyz@mail.example</a> is.</p>

., -, and _ can occur on both sides of the @, but only . may occur at the end of the email address, in which case it will not be considered part of the address:

Example 631

Markdown HTML Demo
 
a.b-c_d@a.b

a.b-c_d@a.b.

a.b-c_d@a.b-

a.b-c_d@a.b_


<p><a href="mailto:a.b-c_d@a.b">a.b-c_d@a.b</a></p>
<p><a href="mailto:a.b-c_d@a.b">a.b-c_d@a.b</a>.</p>
<p>a.b-c_d@a.b-</p>
<p>a.b-c_d@a.b_</p>