markdown-link 0.7.0

Parse and resolve Markdown and wiki-style links in notes: every `[[link]]`, `![[embed]]`, and relative Markdown link in a note body or its frontmatter, with code spans excluded, plus a LinkIndex that resolves a target against a set of file paths.
Documentation 
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167

# markdown-link

Parse and resolve Markdown and wiki-style links in notes, in Rust.

Notes link to each other in several forms. `[[Note]]`, `[[Note#Heading|alias]]`,
`![[image.png]]`, relative Markdown links and frontmatter values all point at
files by a name or a partial path. Resolving a name to the right file needs
clear rules. Getting those rules wrong gives broken link graphs and broken
renames.

markdown-link does two jobs:

- Find every link in a note: `[[wikilink]]`, `![[embed]]`, relative Markdown
  links, and links in frontmatter values. Code spans and code blocks are
  skipped.
- Resolve a link target against a set of file paths. Any path suffix reaches
  a file, and when several files match, the one in the linking note's folder
  wins, then the shorter path.

The resolver follows documented link-resolution conventions. A fixture vault
and a shared case file, which other language ports can run, check the
behaviour.

## Who it is for

Programs that read or change a folder of notes: link graph builders, search
indexers, static site generators, linters, and tools that rewrite links when
a file is renamed.

## When not to use it

- You only need to render wikilinks to HTML as part of an mdBook build. Use
  `mdbook-wikilink`.
- You need a full Markdown parser or an editor model. markdown-link only finds
  and resolves links. Pair it with a Markdown parser if you need more.
- You need note-app features beyond links, such as tags, properties queries,
  canvas or plugins.

## How it compares

- [`trama`](https://crates.io/crates/trama) is a library. It extracts
  wikilinks and builds a file index that resolves a link by file stem,
  ignoring case. It has no path-suffix matching, no tie-break by the linking
  note's folder, and no frontmatter links.
- [`nexis`](https://crates.io/crates/nexis) is a command-line tool for link
  and backlink analysis. It ships no library target.
- [`mdbook-wikilink`](https://crates.io/crates/mdbook-wikilink) is an mdBook
  preprocessor. It turns wikilinks into HTML links for a book. It does not
  expose a link index or a scanner.
- The same author publishes related libraries, and markdown-link uses two of
  them: [`yaml-splice`](https://crates.io/crates/yaml-splice) edits YAML in
  place and supplies the frontmatter value type, and
  [`slug-collate`](https://crates.io/crates/slug-collate) supplies the
  case- and accent-insensitive path order that breaks ties.
  `frontmatter-lossless` splits a note into frontmatter and body; it is only
  used by markdown-link's own tests.

markdown-link combines the link scanner, the path-suffix resolution rules and
a fixture-vault test suite in one library.

## Install

```sh
cargo add markdown-link
```

## Quick start

```rust
use markdown_link::{LinkIndex, LinkKind, body_links};

let vault = vec![
    "Projects/Plan.md".to_string(),
    "Daily/2026-10-18.md".to_string(),
    "Assets/diagram.png".to_string(),
];
let index = LinkIndex::build(&vault);

let note = "See [[Plan]] and ![[diagram.png]]. Not a link: `[[Plan]]`.";
for link in body_links(note) {
    let found = index.resolve_from(&link.target, "Daily/2026-10-18.md");
    println!("{:?} {} -> {:?}", link.kind, link.target, found);
}

assert_eq!(index.resolve("Plan"), Some("Projects/Plan.md"));
assert_eq!(body_links(note)[1].kind, LinkKind::Embed);
```

### Options for a stricter reader

The defaults above are the long-standing behaviour. A tool that renders or
publishes notes can ask for more:

- `body_links_spanned_with(body, &ScanOptions { .. })` picks the code rules
  (`CodeRules::SkillExport` for skill renderers), skips links inside HTML
  comments, and reads `[[#Heading]]` as a link to the note it is in.
- Each parsed link carries its `heading`, its `block` (`#^id`) and an embed's
  `size` (`|300` or `|300x200`).
- `LinkIndex::resolve_strict` refuses a name several files answer to,
  returning `ResolveError::Ambiguous` with every candidate, where
  `resolve_from` picks one. `LinkIndex::candidates` lists them.
- `relative_link(from, to, fragment)`, `encode_uri_component`,
  `encode_uri_fragment` and `escape_label` write a resolved link back out as
  a relative markdown link.

```rust
use markdown_link::code::CodeRules;
use markdown_link::{LinkIndex, ResolveError, ScanOptions, body_links_spanned_with, relative_link};

let options = ScanOptions {
    code_rules: CodeRules::SkillExport,
    skip_html_comments: true,
    self_links: true,
};
let links = body_links_spanned_with("<!-- [[Draft]] --> [[Plan#^step2]]", &options);
assert_eq!(links.len(), 1);
assert_eq!(links[0].block.as_deref(), Some("step2"));

let index = LinkIndex::build(&["a/Plan.md".to_string(), "b/Plan.md".to_string()]);
assert!(matches!(index.resolve_strict("Plan", "x.md"), Err(ResolveError::Ambiguous(_))));
assert_eq!(relative_link("a/x.md", "a/Plan.md", Some("Step 2")), "Plan.md#Step%202");
```

The public items are documented on [docs.rs](https://docs.rs/markdown-link).

## Supported versions

- Rust: 1.89 or newer. This is the only place the number is stated in
  prose. The source of truth is the workspace's `rust-version`, which the
  crate inherits with `rust-version.workspace = true`.

## Platforms

Any platform with `std`. The crate has no platform-specific code and no
`unsafe` code.

## Stability

This is a 0.x crate. Breaking changes are possible between minor versions and
are listed in the [changelog](CHANGELOG.md).

## Design decisions

Short notes on settled design choices are in [decisions/](decisions/).

## TypeScript twin

[`@osdlc/markdown-link`](https://www.npmjs.com/package/@osdlc/markdown-link)
is the TypeScript twin of the crate's parsing half: the code lexer, the link
scanner (with `ScanOptions`), display text and typed references. It does
not resolve or write links yet: `LinkIndex`, `relative_link` and the URI
encoders are Rust only. It
sits beside the crate, in
[`packages/ts/markdown-link`](https://github.com/osdlc/osdlc/tree/main/packages/ts/markdown-link).
Its tests read this crate's `tests/fixtures/conformance.json`, so the two
agree on every case in it. Its offsets count UTF-16 code units, where the
crate's count bytes.

## Source

The crate lives in the [osdlc/osdlc](https://github.com/osdlc/osdlc)
repository, in `packages/rust/markdown-link`.

## License

Licensed under either of [Apache License, Version 2.0](LICENSE-APACHE) or
[MIT License](LICENSE-MIT), at your option.