Last month I posted a small HtmlHelper to make transforming Markdown in an ASP.NET MVC application a little easier. Unfortunately, getting it up and running wasn't quite so easy... You had to go and download MarkdownSharp (or copy the code file from the Google Code site) and put it in your project, then copy/paste my code into a file, add the namespace to a Views/Web.config, and blah blah, you gave up already.

Not any more!

I created a package called MarkdownHelper on NuGet. It took me less time to create the package than it took to get up and running previously, but now using the package is as simple as typing the following into the Package Manager Console...

PM> Install-Package MarkdownHelper

... that's it! All done! Now in your views, you can simply type:

@Html.Markdown(Model.YourMarkdownPropertyHere)

This means you no longer have to copy/paste code around. This is mighty useful if you're using Markdown in multiple ASP.NET MVC applications.

Rather than creating another assembly to import, the helper class will be put directly into your project (inside a cryptically named "Helpers" folder), though if this isn't the done thing, I can change it easily enough.

Also worth noting that I changed from MarkdownSharp to MarkdownDeep.NET. In addition to being faster (which isn't really important unless you're transforming a lot of text), it has a Javascript version that works transforms 100% the same, which will come in handy if you're writing an editor. Currently the package imports only the .NET version, though this might change as I add functionality.