easy markdown previews / renders in ubuntu 14.04 (or Mac)

easy markdown previews.sh

# this goes in your .bashrc (or maybe .bash_profile on a Mac)
function readmarkdown() {
  TMPFILE=`mktemp`.pdf
  pandoc "$@" -o $TMPFILE
  evince $TMPFILE
  rm $TMPFILE
}

#  OR, for fancy formatting you can use --listings (this requires the latex-xcolor package)
function readmarkdown() {
  TMPFILE=`mktemp`.pdf
  pandoc "$@" --listings -H /path/to/listings-setup.tex -o $TMPFILE
  
  # for Ubuntu
  evince $TMPFILE
  rm $TMPFILE
  
  # for Mac
  open $TMPFILE
  # the rm $TMPFILE breaks things on Mac, so don't do it!
}

how to use.sh

# once things are set up, this is how you use it:

readmarkdown README.md

install prerequisites on mac.sh

#!/bin/bash

brew install pandoc

# install BasicTex.pkg from here http://www.ctan.org/pkg/mactex-basic
# then restart your BASH session so you can run the following command

sudo tlmgr install collection-fontsrecommended

# setup the listings latex file, setup the BASH function in your bashrc

install prerequisites on ubuntu.sh

# these packages can be pretty big, so I'd recommended not installing the recommended packages...

sudo apt-get install pandoc --no-install-recommends
sudo apt-get install texlive-latex-base --no-install-recommends
sudo apt-get install texlive-fonts-recommended --no-install-recommends
sudo apt-get install texlive-latex-recommended --no-install-recommends

# here's a one-liner that should work

sudo apt-get install pandoc texlive-latex-base texlive-fonts-recommended texlive-latex-recommended --no-install-recommends

# an additional package can help with custom formatting (and is ~ 600kB)

sudo apt-get install latex-xcolor

listings-setup.tex

% Contents of listings-setup.tex
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage[top=1in, bottom=1in, left=1in, right=1in]{geometry}

\lstset{
    basicstyle=\ttfamily,
    numbers=left,
    keywordstyle=\color[rgb]{0.13,0.29,0.53}\bfseries,
    stringstyle=\color[rgb]{0.31,0.60,0.02},
    commentstyle=\color[rgb]{0.56,0.35,0.01}\itshape,
    numberstyle=\color[RGB]{150,150,150}\footnotesize,
    stepnumber=1,
    numbersep=4pt,
    backgroundcolor=\color[RGB]{248,248,248},
    showspaces=false,
    showstringspaces=false,
    showtabs=false,
    tabsize=2,
    captionpos=b,
    breaklines=true,
    breakatwhitespace=true,
    breakautoindent=true,
    escapeinside={\%*}{*)},
    linewidth=\textwidth,
    basewidth=0.5em,
}
                                                                        
                                                                        

I prefer this over the popular "markdown editors" because the best markdown editor is really just a text editor. Live preview is distracting. However, rendering a well-formatted document can be useful sometimes!

credit goes to JLDiaz at the TeX StackExchange site for producing an awesome style for the PDF

http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/179926/pandoc-markdown-to-pdf-without-cutting-off-code-block-lines-that-are-too-long

I use a Mac for work these days, so I added a new file with an example on how to install prerequisites for Mac OS X 10.11.6:

https://gist.github.com/dayer4b/a5935fc1f34511964ff0#file-install-prerequisites-on-mac-sh