For those who actually don’t know: MarkDown (the markup language used by Lemmy and Reddit) uses the backslash as a “cancel” command. And it uses the underscores as an italicize command, just like the *asterisks* you’re probably in the habit of using.
For instance, _this_ turns into this. But when I cancel those underscores with a backslash \_like this\_ they appear.
So why does the backslash disappear on the ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ face? For starters, the backslash cancels the underscores around the head. So the underscores show up, but the arm doesn’t. So what if we try two backslashes? Then we get:
¯\(ツ)/¯
The first backslash canceled out the second, but now the underscores are italicizing the head. So let’s try three:
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Now the first backslash is canceling out the second, and the third backslash is canceling out the underscore.
For those who actually don’t know: MarkDown (the markup language used by Lemmy and Reddit) uses the backslash as a “cancel” command. And it uses the underscores as an italicize command, just like the *asterisks* you’re probably in the habit of using.
For instance, _this_ turns into this. But when I cancel those underscores with a backslash \_like this\_ they appear.
So why does the backslash disappear on the ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ face? For starters, the backslash cancels the underscores around the head. So the underscores show up, but the arm doesn’t. So what if we try two backslashes? Then we get:
¯\(ツ)/¯
The first backslash canceled out the second, but now the underscores are italicizing the head. So let’s try three:
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Now the first backslash is canceling out the second, and the third backslash is canceling out the underscore.
Haha you’re almost ready to start using regex.
It’s called an escape character.
I know. The point is to avoid using jargon. Or at least explain the jargon you do use.