html2text 2014.12.29

Turn HTML into equivalent Markdown-structured text.

# html2text

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[](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/html2text/)
[](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/html2text/)
[](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/html2text/)
[](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/html2text/)
[](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/html2text/)
[](https://pypi.python.org/pypi/html2text/)


html2text is a Python script that converts a page of HTML into clean, easy-to-read plain ASCII text. Better yet, that ASCII also happens to be valid Markdown (a text-to-HTML format).


Usage: `html2text [(filename|url) [encoding]]`


| Option | Description
|--------------------------------------------------------|---------------------------------------------------
| `--version` | Show program's version number and exit
| `-h`, `--help` | Show this help message and exit
| `--ignore-links` | Don't include any formatting for links
|`--protect-links` | Protect links from line breaks surrounding them "+" with angle brackets
|`--ignore-images` | Don't include any formatting for images
|`--images-to-alt` | Discard image data, only keep alt text
|`-g`, `--google-doc` | Convert an html-exported Google Document
|`-d`, `--dash-unordered-list` | Use a dash rather than a star for unordered list items
|`-b` `BODY_WIDTH`, `--body-width`=`BODY_WIDTH` | Number of characters per output line, `0` for no wrap
|`-i` `LIST_INDENT`, `--google-list-indent`=`LIST_INDENT`| Number of pixels Google indents nested lists
|`-s`, `--hide-strikethrough` | Hide strike-through text. only relevent when `-g` is specified as well
|`--escape-all` | Escape all special characters. Output is less readable, but avoids corner case formatting issues.
| `--bypass-tables` | Format tables in HTML rather than Markdown syntax.
| `--single-line-break` | Use a single line break after a block element rather than two.


Or you can use it from within `Python`:

```
>>> import html2text
>>>
>>> print(html2text.html2text("<p><strong>Zed's</strong> dead baby, <em>Zed's</em> dead.</p>"))
**Zed's** dead baby, _Zed's_ dead.

```


Or with some configuration options:
```
>>> import html2text
>>>
>>> h = html2text.HTML2Text()
>>> # Ignore converting links from HTML
>>> h.ignore_links = True
>>> print h.handle("<p>Hello, <a href='http://earth.google.com/'>world</a>!")
Hello, world!

>>> print(h.handle("<p>Hello, <a href='http://earth.google.com/'>world</a>!"))

Hello, world!

>>> # Don't Ignore links anymore, I like links
>>> h.ignore_links = False
>>> print(h.handle("<p>Hello, <a href='http://earth.google.com/'>world</a>!"))
Hello, [world](http://earth.google.com/)!

```

*Originally written by Aaron Swartz. This code is distributed under the GPLv3.*


## How to install

`html2text` is available on pypi
https://pypi.python.org/pypi/html2text

```
$ pip install html2text
```


## How to run unit tests

PYTHONPATH=$PYTHONPATH:. coverage run --source=html2text setup.py test -v