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Quick Start

Get up and running with rumdl in minutes.

Basic Usage

Check for issues

# Lint all Markdown files in current directory
rumdl check .

# Lint specific files
rumdl check README.md docs/

# Lint with verbose output
rumdl check --verbose .

Fix issues automatically

# Auto-fix all issues (formatter mode - always exits 0)
rumdl fmt .

# Auto-fix with violation reporting (exits 1 if unfixable issues remain)
rumdl check --fix .

Stdin/stdout formatting

# Format from stdin
echo "# Hello  World" | rumdl fmt -

# Pipe through rumdl
cat README.md | rumdl fmt - > README.fixed.md

Create a Configuration File

Initialize a default configuration:

# Create .rumdl.toml with defaults
rumdl init

# Create with specific preset
rumdl init --preset google

This creates a .rumdl.toml file in your current directory.

Example Configuration

.rumdl.toml
[global]
# Exclude files/directories
exclude = ["node_modules", "vendor", ".git"]

# Set line length limit
line-length = 120

[MD013]  # Line length
line_length = 120
code_blocks = false  # Don't check code blocks

[MD033]  # No inline HTML
allowed_elements = ["br", "details", "summary"]

[MD041]  # First line heading
enabled = false  # Disable this rule

Common Workflows

Editor Integration

For real-time linting in VS Code:

rumdl vscode

Pre-commit Hook

Add to .pre-commit-config.yaml:

repos:
  - repo: https://github.com/rvben/rumdl
    rev: v0.0.222  # Use latest version
    hooks:
      - id: rumdl

CI/CD Pipeline

.github/workflows/lint.yml
name: Lint Markdown
on: [push, pull_request]

jobs:
  lint:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: rvben/rumdl-action@main

Understanding Output

rumdl outputs issues in a clear format:

README.md:10:1: MD022 Headings should be surrounded by blank lines [heading-blank-lines]
README.md:15:81: MD013 Line length [Expected: 80; Actual: 95] [line-length]
docs/guide.md:5:1: MD041 First line in a file should be a top-level heading [first-line-heading]

Found 3 issues in 2 files

Each line shows:

  • File path and line:column
  • Rule ID (e.g., MD022)
  • Description of the issue
  • Rule alias in brackets

Exit Codes

Code Meaning
0 Success (no issues, or fmt mode)
1 Violations found
2 Configuration or runtime error

Next Steps