SugarMarkdown

Formerly published as sugarcraft/candy-shine (renamed 2026-10). Namespace changed: SugarCraft\Shine\ → SugarCraft\Markdown\.

sugar-markdown — a Markdown → ANSI renderer for PHP 8.3+, built on league/commonmark and SugarStyle.

composer require sugarcraft/sugar-markdown

The Renderer exposes short-form aliases on every option: theme / wordWrap / hyperlinks / baseURL / tableWrap / inlineTableLinks / preservedNewLines / emoji / standardStyle. The long-form with* names still work — pick whichever reads better at the call site.

Quickstart

The example below embeds a fenced code block inside its Markdown sample, so the snippet itself is fenced with tildes — four backticks would truncate the heredoc on GitHub too:

use SugarCraft\Markdown\Renderer;

echo (new Renderer())->render(<<<MD
# Welcome

A few **bold** and _italic_ words, with `inline code` and a
[link](https://example.com).

- one
- two
- three

```php
echo "hello world";
```
MD);

Themes

Stock presets:

use SugarCraft\Markdown\{Renderer, Theme};

new Renderer(Theme::ansi());        // default colourful
new Renderer(Theme::plain());       // no SGR
new Renderer(Theme::notty());       // alias for plain — non-TTY fallback
new Renderer(Theme::ascii());       // monochrome bold/italic/underline, no colour
new Renderer(Theme::dark());        // dark-bg optimised
new Renderer(Theme::light());       // light-bg optimised
new Renderer(Theme::dracula());     // #282a36 / #ff79c6 palette
new Renderer(Theme::tokyoNight());  // #1a1b26 / #7aa2f7
new Renderer(Theme::pink());        // playful sweet palette

Custom JSON theme (Theme::fromJson($path) reads the same JSON from a file; fromJsonString() takes it inline):

use SugarCraft\Markdown\{Renderer, Theme};

$theme = Theme::fromJsonString('{"heading1":{"foreground":"#ff5f87","bold":true}}');
echo (new Renderer($theme))->render("# Styled\n");

JSON shape: an object keyed by element name (heading1, paragraph, bold, italic, code, codeBlock, link, blockquote, listMarker, rule, keyword, string, number, comment, strike, linkText, image, htmlBlock, htmlSpan, definitionTerm, definitionDescription, text, autolink); each value carries foreground / background (hex / ansi:N / ansi256:N) plus the SGR flags (bold, italic, underline, strike, faint, blink, reverse).

Word-wrap + OSC 8 hyperlinks

use SugarCraft\Markdown\{Renderer, Theme};

$renderer = (new Renderer(Theme::dark()))
    ->withWordWrap(80)
    ->withHyperlinks(true);

echo $renderer->render("# Word wrap\n");

withHyperlinks(true) (default) wraps every [text](url) in OSC 8 ; ; URL ST text OSC 8 ; ; ST so terminals that support it render real clickable links. Falls back to text (url) when off.

Link safety

Only the OSC-8 envelope is actionable; the (url) suffix is plain text. A refused scheme — javascript:, data:, vbscript: — never opens an OSC-8 target, so a hostile document cannot execute code through a click: the link text and its (url) suffix still render, visible and inert. Every other scheme passes to the terminal's opener unfiltered — treat non-http(s) / mailto targets the way you would treat a raw terminal. Control bytes (C0, DEL, ESC, BEL) are stripped from every URL unconditionally. Numeric-entity scheme spellings (e.g. &#006A;avascript:) reach the terminal as literal entities — destinations are never entity-decoded — so their emitted target is inert and forms no scheme.

withSanitize(false) relaxes only the general text pipeline, for trusted input where control characters must survive: raw HTML blocks and inline HTML stay control-stripped regardless of the flag, and URL stripping is likewise always on. See the fleet-wide trust model in docs/TRUST-BOUNDARY.md.

Streaming

Renderer::stream() consumes Markdown chunk by chunk and yields styled ANSI as each top-level section is proven complete — so bytes can reach the terminal while the tail of the document is still arriving. Chunk boundaries never influence output: for every split of the same input bytes, implode('', iterator_to_array($renderer->stream($chunks))) equals $renderer->render($bytes) byte for byte.

use SugarCraft\Markdown\{Renderer, Theme};

$renderer = (new Renderer(Theme::dark()))->withWordWrap(80);
foreach ($renderer->stream(["# Heading\n\n", "Paragraph **now**.\n"]) as $chunk) {
    echo $chunk; // the heading is on screen while the tail is still arriving
}

Writer is the push-side twin: Writer::toPath($renderer, $path) or Writer::toStream($renderer, $resource) accept chunks through feed() and write every completed section through the sink immediately, one flush per section. close() renders the final section and finishes; the writer is single-use and feed() after close() throws. Renderers whose theme configures document-scope post-processing (documentMargin, documentIndent, block prefix/suffix) or that run withPreservedNewLines(true) buffer the whole document and emit once at the end — $renderer->defersStreaming() reports which regime applies. Renderer::writer($sink), Renderer::renderSection() and StreamSink are the same family's lower-level parts.

use SugarCraft\Markdown\{Renderer, Writer};

$writer = Writer::toStream(new Renderer(), STDOUT);
$writer->feed("# Live\n\n");
$writer->feed("first section proven\n");
$writer->close();

What it renders

• Headings 1-6, paragraphs, **bold**, _italic_, ~~strike~~.
• Inline code, fenced code blocks (with regex syntax highlighting for PHP / JS / TS / JSON / Python / Go / Bash / SQL), indented code.
• Bullet + ordered + nested lists.
• Block quotes (▎-prefixed).
• GFM tables (rounded border, via the sugar-style table renderer SugarCraft\Style\Table\Table).
• Task lists (☑ / ☐).
• Definition lists (term / indented : description).
• Links (with OSC 8 hyperlinks), autolinks, images (alt + url).
• HTML blocks + inline HTML — pass through with theme styling.
• Thematic breaks.

Authoring a custom theme

A Theme is a value object — every slot is a Style (or scalar). Build one with the constructor and feed it to new Renderer($theme):

use SugarCraft\Core\Util\Color;
use SugarCraft\Markdown\{Renderer, Theme};
use SugarCraft\Style\Style;

$theme = new Theme(
    heading1:  Style::new()->bold()->underline()->foreground(Color::hex('#ff5f87')),
    heading2:  Style::new()->bold()->foreground(Color::hex('#ffd700')),
    heading3:  Style::new()->bold()->foreground(Color::ansi(14)),
    heading4:  Style::new()->bold()->foreground(Color::ansi(12)),
    heading5:  Style::new()->bold()->foreground(Color::ansi(13)),
    heading6:  Style::new()->bold()->foreground(Color::ansi(10)),
    paragraph: Style::new(),
    bold:      Style::new()->bold(),
    italic:    Style::new()->italic(),
    code:      Style::new()->foreground(Color::hex('#ffd700')),
    codeBlock: Style::new()->faint(),
    link:      Style::new()->underline()->foreground(Color::ansi(12)),
    blockquote: Style::new()->italic()->foreground(Color::ansi(8)),
    listMarker: Style::new()->foreground(Color::hex('#ff5f87')),
    rule:      Style::new()->foreground(Color::ansi(8)),

    // Element extensions:
    headingPrefix:    '❯ ',
    headingCase:      'upper',
    paragraphPrefix:  '  ',
    documentMargin:   1,
    listLevelIndent:  4,
    taskTickedGlyph:  '✓',
    taskUntickedGlyph:'·',
    horizontalRuleGlyph: '═',
    horizontalRuleLength: 60,
);

echo (new Renderer($theme))->render("# Custom\n");

The full slot reference (left-to-right reading the constructor):

Block	Slots
Headings	heading1 … heading6 (with headingPrefix, headingSuffix, headingCase)
Paragraphs	paragraph (+ paragraphPrefix / paragraphSuffix)
Inline	bold · italic · strike · code · link · linkText · autolink · image · imageText · text
Block	codeBlock · blockquote · rule · listMarker · htmlBlock · htmlSpan
Document	documentMargin · documentIndent · documentBlockPrefix / Suffix
Lists	orderedListMarker · unorderedListMarker · orderedListMarkerFormat · unorderedListMarkerGlyph · listLevelIndent
Task list	taskTickedGlyph · taskUntickedGlyph
Horizontal rule	horizontalRuleGlyph · horizontalRuleLength
Tables	tableHeader · tableCell · tableSeparator · tableCenterSeparator · tableColumnSeparator · tableRowSeparator
Definition lists	definitionTerm · definitionDescription · definitionList
Syntax highlighting	keyword · string · number · comment

Stock themes (Theme::ansi(), Theme::dark(), Theme::dracula(), Theme::tokyoNight(), Theme::pink(), Theme::light(), Theme::ascii(), Theme::notty(), Theme::plain()) are good starting points — copy the constructor call and adjust the slots you care about.

Theme::fromEnvironment(?$default) reads GLAMOUR_STYLE (case- insensitive, hyphen / underscore tolerant) so users can override the theme without code changes:

GLAMOUR_STYLE=tokyo-night php examples/render.php

Renderer options

use SugarCraft\Markdown\{Renderer, Theme};

$renderer = (new Renderer(Theme::dark()))
    ->withWordWrap(80)               // wrap paragraphs / blockquotes / lists
    ->withHyperlinks(true)           // emit OSC 8 link envelopes
    ->withBaseURL('https://docs.example.com/')  // prefix relative links
    ->withTableWrap(true)            // wrap text inside table cells
    ->withInlineTableLinks(false)    // suppress (url) suffix in cells
    ->withPreservedNewLines(true)    // keep source blank-line runs between blocks
    ->withStandardStyle('dracula')   // re-pick the stock theme
    ->withEmoji(true);               // expand `:smile:` shortcodes

echo $renderer->render("Hello :wave:\n");

With emoji on, 1,842 codes resolve: the full 1,837-entry GitHub cheat-sheet corpus (GithubEmoji::MAP) merged under the 39 curated house codes — house bytes win every collision — and unknown :codes: pass through verbatim.

Renderer::renderMarkdown($md, ?Theme) is a one-shot static convenience for ad-hoc rendering. For repeated renders with the same theme, build a Renderer and reuse it (the parser is cached per instance).

Test

cd sugar-markdown && composer install && vendor/bin/phpunit

Demos

Render

Themes

Snapshot tests

Render output is covered by golden-file snapshot tests. Fixture files live in tests/fixtures/ with a .golden extension and are compared against actual ANSI byte output via SugarCraft\Testing\Snapshot\Assertions::assertGoldenAnsi(). To re-record fixtures after intentional output changes:

UPDATE_GOLDENS=1 vendor/bin/phpunit

Related

• SugarCraft monorepo
• Originally inspired by charmbracelet/glamour

Credits & inspiration

Originally inspired by the Go Charm ecosystem; SugarCraft is developed as a native PHP project.