When comparing Haroopad vs StackEdit, the Slant community recommends Haroopad for most people. In the question“What are the best open source Markdown editors for UNIX-like systems?” Haroopad is ranked 3rd while StackEdit is ranked 15th. The most important reason people chose Haroopad is:
Haroopad has multiple available themes to choose from and new ones can be easily built with CSS.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Very customizable
Haroopad has multiple available themes to choose from and new ones can be easily built with CSS.
Pro Multiplatform support
Runs on Mac, Windows and Linux with 32-bit and 64-bit binary packages available.
Pro Completely free
Haroopad is a free and open source Markdown Editor.
Pro Various publishing and export options
Haroopad can publish to Wordpress, Evernote, Tumblr and MediaWiki and export to EPub, ReStructured Text, RTF and PDF.
Pro Mathematical expressions support
Haroopad supports mathematical expressions through LaTeX and MathJax.
Pro Supports MathJax
Mathematical equations can be exported to the browser by using MathJax, a JavaScript display engine with a lot of great features such as typography support and modular output.
Pro Allows embedding content from a wide variety of sources
Content from YouTube, Twitter, Vimeo, Slideshare, Flickr, Instagram, Soundcloud, Wikipedia and Pastebin can be embedded in the document.
Pro The Markdown flavor can be extended
Haroopad supports GitHub Markdown flavor out of the box. But the functionality can be extended to support additional Markdown features.
Pro Vi key bindings
For people used ti vi/vim, Haroopad can be set up to be used with vi keybindings.
Pro Dual License
GPL3 license is applied to the current version and will be applied in the future to meet the internal dual licensing scheme.
Commercial use follows Apache license v2 (APLv2) for keeping the GPL license and non-commercial use under consideration.
Pro Works online and offline
StackEdit works within your browser. You need internet access to connect to the website, but once it's loaded, the site does not require an internet connection - you will be able to edit and save files locally. Additionally, you can use Fluid to turn it into a native desktop application.
Pro Supports various Markdown flavors
Supports standard Markdown and Markdown Extra.
Pro Simple workflow
It is very easy to toggle between the preview and the editing windows. The black makes it a very focused writing environment. Of course it's possible to change that if needed.
Pro Great when in full-screen
Pro No need to install additional software
StackEdit works directly from the browser, there's no need to install additional software as long as you have a web browser installed on your computer.
Pro Real-time preview
The preview shows in a collapsible pane on the right hand side.
Pro Instant publishing
StackEdit allows pushing a document directly to a list of publishing or file storage platforms or any SSH server.
Pro Multiple export options
Can export to .txt, .html and .pdf.
Pro Syncs via Dropbox and Drive
Files can be synchronized through Dropbox and Drive.
Cons
Con English translation is iffy
The software was initially developed in Korean for Korean users and later translated and ported to English. The translation to English has not been perfect and there may be some weird expressions and grammatical errors along the way.
Con Documentation is in Korean
The official documentation is in Korean, so it may be a bit hard for non-Korean speakers to find their way around Haroopad.
Con Windows installer does not support easy admin installation
It can't request the necessary privileges to install to C:\Program Files.
Con Undo sometimes loses control about the selection
Select some text, select a formatting in the Markdown Syntax Helper view, undo.
Con Code pane is dark in default theme
Can be hard to read and a bit hard to find where to change it.
Con Saves files in browser's local storage
Local storage is limited and if the browser crashes the text can be lost.
Con Cannot be accessed while being offline
Even though the editor itself works offline, you need internet access to open the website and the editor.
Con Lacks a good integrated spell checker
Uses the built-in browser spell checker which may not be as good as spell checkers other editors have. Depending on the browser, of course.
Con Publishing to GitHub requires giving write access to repos
In order to publish documents to GitHub, StackEdit requires writing access to your repos, something which many people may not be comfortable with.