Treat the following character as a plain charactere instead of a markup delimiter.

Works with:

• ✓ Playgrounds

• ✓ Symbol documentation

Syntax and Examples

Display a special character by preceding it with a backslash (\).

Use the backslash to display a special character in the following cases.

• The special character is first character of a playground line formatting delimiter.

  For example, to display a single-line delimiter inside of a line delimiter, precede the colon (:) with a backslash. The colon is the first special character of the single-line delimiter.

  1. //: //\: This is how to write a single line of playground markup

  

• The special character is the first character of a playground multiline formatting delimiter.

  For example, to display an asterisk (*) at the start of a line instead of a bullet point, precede the asterisk with a backslash.

  1. //: \* This is not a bullet item
  2. //: * This is a bullet item

  

• The special character is the first character of a Quick Help delimiter.

  For example, to display an asterisk (*) at the start of a line instead of a bullet point, precede the asterisk with a backslash.

  1. /**
  2. A simple example of using *display delimiter*
  4. Do not show the first line as a bullet item
  6. \* This is not a bullet item
  8. * This is a bullet item
  9. */

  

• The character is an inline delimiter that appears at the start or end of a different character.

  For example, the following markup code displays an asterisk (*) with emphasis. Asterisks are normally used as the delimiter for a range of characters displayed with emphasis.

  Playground Example

  1. //: Show the *middle asterisk\* with emphasis*

  

  Quick Help Example

  1. /**
  2. Display a special character with formatting
  4. Show the *middle asterisk\* with emphasis*
  5. */

  

• To override the effects of a newline such as text wrapping or creating paragraphs.

  The following markup shows escaping a the effect of a newline in a playground.

  1. /*:
  2.  These two lines
  3.  wrap
  5.  These two lines\
  6.  do not
  7. */

  

You do not need to use the backslash with special characters inside a code block or backquote delimited code.