Today I published my second python cli tool, markdown-anki-decks. The tool takes a directory of markdown files and converts them into a directory of anki decks. Basically all of the code is glue code, the library builds on top of commonmark, beautifulsoup, and genanki. But for a side project glue code is ideal. There is very little to maintain.

I like the tool because it uses a straightforward syntax with h2 headers converted to questions and everything between h2 headers converted to answers. Most importantly the tool automatically updates cards on follow up imports rather than duplicating them and losing your anki progress.

I can now edit my anki decks using plain text, publish my anki decks as web pages using gatsby, and automatically generate my anki decks whenever I want to import them.

There are already several libraries which can be used to write anki decks in markdown but none of them quite do what I want.

• Ankdown supports latex with Mathjax (my library does not), but Ankdown uses a very odd syntax for specifying cards and Ankdown card syncing breaks when cards are removed from the markdown file.
• mdanki is actually very close to what I want but has issues with syncing and updating cards. If you try to reload the same deck every single card is duplicated. That problem might be solved soon but it makes the library useless since cards cannot be added to a deck without losing all progress.

If you like Ankdown or mdanki but are frustrated by the same things I am then you may like markdown-anki-decks. Check out the github repo and let me know if you find it useful.