Asynchronous Academy

Submitting Written Assignments

We've moved away from complicated file formats and expensive proprietary software for written assignments. Instead, we use Markdown (.md).

Markdown is a simple, plain-text format that is universally supported. It's the standard for documentation in the tech industry, the native language of Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, and it completely eliminates the need for you to purchase clunky, high-cost word processing software just to submit an essay. It's lightweight, future-proof, and easy to use.

Here are two easy ways to create and submit a Markdown file for your assignments.

Option 1: Use Google Docs (Recommended)

If you are already comfortable writing your essays and assignments in Google Docs, you can keep doing exactly that! Google Docs has built-in support for exporting your work as a Markdown file.

  1. Write your assignment in Google Docs just like you normally would. Use the toolbar to add headings, bold text, italics, and links.
  2. When you are finished and ready to submit, go to the top menu and click File.
  3. Select Download.
  4. Choose Markdown (.md) from the list of options.

Your browser will download a .md file to your computer. You can upload this file directly to the marking queue!

Option 2: Write Markdown Directly

Because Markdown is just plain text, you don't need any special software to write it. You can use the free text editor that came with your computer: Notepad (on Windows) or TextEdit (on Mac).

When you write in plain text, you use a few simple symbols to tell the computer how to format your words. Don't worry, it's not intimidating—it only takes a minute to learn the basics!

Here is all the formatting you need for a typical assignment:

Headings

To create a heading, just put a hashtag (#) and a space before your text. Use more hashtags for smaller sub-headings.

# My Essay Title
## A Subtitle
### A Smaller Section Heading

Bold and Italics

To make text bold, put two asterisks around it. For italics, use just one asterisk.

This is **bold text**.
This is *italic text*.

Links

To add a link, put the text you want people to click in square brackets [like this], immediately followed by the URL in parentheses (like this).

You can learn more on the [Async Academy website](https://asyncacademy.ca).

Saving Your File

When you are done writing in Notepad or TextEdit, go to File > Save As.... When you name your file, make sure to add .md to the end of the filename (for example: my-essay.md). If your editor asks about the file format, make sure it is saved as "Plain Text" and not "Rich Text" or a .txt file.

That's it! You're now writing in the same format used by top software engineers and AI models around the world. Upload your new .md file to the marking queue to submit your assignment.