---
layout: docs
title: Templates
prev_section: migrations
next_section: permalinks
permalink: /docs/templates/
---

Jekyll uses the [Liquid](http://wiki.shopify.com/Liquid) templating language to
process templates. All of the standard Liquid [tags](http://wiki.shopify.com/Logic) and
[filters](http://wiki.shopify.com/Filters) are
supported. Jekyll even adds a few handy filters and tags of its own to make
common tasks easier.

## Filters

<div class="mobile-side-scroller">
<table>
  <thead>
    <tr>
      <th>Description</th>
      <th><span class="filter">Filter</span> and <span class="output">Output</span></th>
    </tr>
  </thead>
  <tbody>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Date to XML Schema</strong></p>
        <p>Convert a Date into XML Schema (ISO 8601) format.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ site.time | date_to_xmlschema }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>2008-11-07T13:07:54-08:00</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Date to RFC-822 Format</strong></p>
        <p>Convert a Date into the RFC-822 format used for RSS feeds.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ site.time | date_to_rfc822 }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>Mon, 07 Nov 2008 13:07:54 -0800</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Date to String</strong></p>
        <p>Convert a date to short format.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ site.time | date_to_string }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>07 Nov 2008</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Date to Long String</strong></p>
        <p>Format a date to long format.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ site.time | date_to_long_string }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>07 November 2008</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>XML Escape</strong></p>
        <p>Escape some text for use in XML.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ page.content | xml_escape }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>CGI Escape</strong></p>
        <p>
          CGI escape a string for use in a URL. Replaces any special characters
          with appropriate %XX replacements.
        </p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ “foo,bar;baz?” | cgi_escape }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>foo%2Cbar%3Bbaz%3F</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>URI Escape</strong></p>
        <p>
          URI escape a string.
        </p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ “'foo, bar \\baz?'” | uri_escape }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>foo,%20bar%20%5Cbaz?</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Number of Words</strong></p>
        <p>Count the number of words in some text.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ page.content | number_of_words }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>1337</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Array to Sentence</strong></p>
        <p>Convert an array into a sentence. Useful for listing tags.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ page.tags | array_to_sentence_string }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
        <p>
          <code class='output'>foo, bar, and baz</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Textilize</strong></p>
        <p>Convert a Textile-formatted string into HTML, formatted via RedCloth</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ page.excerpt | textilize }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Markdownify</strong></p>
        <p>Convert a Markdown-formatted string into HTML.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ page.excerpt | markdownify }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
        <p class='name'><strong>Data To JSON</strong></p>
        <p>Convert Hash or Array to JSON.</p>
      </td>
      <td class='align-center'>
        <p>
         <code class='filter'>{% raw %}{{ site.data.projects | jsonify }}{% endraw %}</code>
        </p>
      </td>
    </tr>
  </tbody>
</table>
</div>

## Tags

### Includes

If you have small page fragments that you wish to include in multiple places on
your site, you can use the `include` tag.

{% highlight ruby %}
{% raw %}{% include footer.html %}{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

Jekyll expects all include files to be placed in an `_includes` directory at the
root of your source directory. This will embed the contents of
`<source>/_includes/footer.html` into the calling file.

<div class="note">
  <h5>ProTip™: Use variables as file name</h5>
  <p>

    The name of the file you wish to embed can be literal (as in the example above),
    or you can use a variable, using liquid-like variable syntax as in
    <code>{% raw %}{% include {{my_variable}} %}{% endraw %}</code>.

    Note that unlike usual liquid variable syntax, you cannot have spaces inside the curly braces.

  </p>
</div>

You can also pass parameters to an include:

{% highlight ruby %}
{% raw %}{% include footer.html param="value" %}{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

These parameters are available via Liquid in the include:

{% highlight ruby %}
{% raw %}{{ include.param }}{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

### Code snippet highlighting

Jekyll has built in support for syntax highlighting of [over 100
languages](http://pygments.org/languages/) thanks to
[Pygments](http://pygments.org/). To use Pygments, you must have Python installed on your
system and set `pygments` to `true` in your site's configuration file.

To render a code block with syntax highlighting, surround your code as follows:

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
{% highlight ruby %}
def foo
  puts 'foo'
end
{% endhighlight %}
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

The argument to the `highlight` tag (`ruby` in the example above) is the
language identifier. To find the appropriate identifier to use for the language
you want to highlight, look for the “short name” on the [Lexers
page](http://pygments.org/docs/lexers/).

#### Line numbers

There is a second argument to `highlight` called `linenos` that is optional.
Including the `linenos` argument will force the highlighted code to include line
numbers. For instance, the following code block would include line numbers next
to each line:

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
{% highlight ruby linenos %}
def foo
  puts 'foo'
end
{% endhighlight %}
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

#### Stylesheets for syntax highlighting

In order for the highlighting to show up, you’ll need to include a highlighting
stylesheet. For an example stylesheet you can look at
[syntax.css](http://github.com/mojombo/tpw/tree/master/css/syntax.css). These
are the same styles as used by GitHub and you are free to use them for your own
site. If you use `linenos`, you might want to include an additional CSS class
definition for the `.lineno` class in `syntax.css` to distinguish the line
numbers from the highlighted code.

### Post URL

If you would like to include a link to a post on your site, the `post_url` tag
will generate the correct permalink URL for the post you specify.

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
{% post_url 2010-07-21-name-of-post %}
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

If you organize your posts in subdirectories, you need to include subdirectory 
path to the post:

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
{% post_url /subdir/2010-07-21-name-of-post %}
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

There is no need to include the file extension when using the `post_url` tag.

You can also use this tag to create a link to a post in Markdown as follows:

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
[Name of Link]({% post_url 2010-07-21-name-of-post %})
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

### Gist

Use the `gist` tag to easily embed a GitHub Gist onto your site:

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
{% gist 5555251 %}
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

You may also optionally specify the filename in the gist to display:

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
{% gist 5555251 result.md %}
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

The `gist` tag also works with private gists, which require the gist owner's
github username:

{% highlight text %}
{% raw %}
{% gist parkr/931c1c8d465a04042403 %}
{% endraw %}
{% endhighlight %}

The private gist syntax also supports filenames.