Textile to ICO Converter
FileFlip converts Textile to ICO entirely inside your browser, using Pandoc, MuPDF and ImageMagick compiled to WebAssembly. The file is never uploaded to a server: it is read off your disk, converted on your own machine, and saved back by the browser. That means no file-size limit, no queue and no account.
How do I convert a Textile file to ICO?#
- Drop your Textile file onto the converter at the top of this page, or click it to pick one from your computer. You can add as many as you like.
- Leave the target set to ICO and the conversion starts on its own. FileFlip downloads 79.9 MB of WebAssembly the first time and nothing after that, then runs Pandoc, MuPDF and ImageMagick on your own machine.
- Save the ICO file. Your browser writes it straight to your downloads folder, because there was never a server holding it.
Does converting Textile to ICO lose quality?#
Yes, in the sense that text stops being text. Each Textile page is rendered to pixels and handed to ICO, so the result looks right and can no longer be selected, searched, or reflowed.
Is it safe to convert Textile files online?#
Yes, because nothing is uploaded. FileFlip converts Textile files inside the browser tab you already have open, using WebAssembly builds of the same engines a desktop converter would install. Your file is read from your own disk into the page's memory, and no request carrying it is ever made.
You do not have to take that on trust. Open your browser's network panel, run a conversion, and you will see the engine come down and your file go nowhere. There is no upload, no server-side copy, no retention window, and no account tied to what you converted.
How FileFlip works lists every engine, its version and its download size, and shows how to check for yourself that nothing leaves your machine.
What Textile to ICO actually does to the file#
Converting Textile to ICO runs on Pandoc, MuPDF and ImageMagick, downloads 79.9 MB of WebAssembly the first time and nothing after that, renders each page to pixels, keeps page layout, and drops selectable text and transparency.
| Engine | Pandoc, MuPDF and ImageMagick |
|---|---|
| Conversion path | 3 steps: Textile → HTML → PNG → ICO |
| Downloaded to your browser | 79.9 MB, once, then cached by your browser |
| Quality | Text becomes pixels |
| You get back | One image per page, zipped when the source has several |
| Where it runs | In a background worker, so the page stays responsive |
What survives the conversion
| What is in the file | This conversion | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Selectable text | Dropped | The target format has nowhere to put it. |
| Page layout | Kept | Carried through into the converted file. |
| Transparency | Dropped | The target format has nowhere to put it. |
Worth knowing before you start:
- pages render at twice their point size in opaque RGB, roughly 144 DPI, with no transparency
- reflowable input is laid out on a fixed 595x842pt page at 11pt before anything else happens
- the file passes through HTML on the way, so anything HTML cannot express does not survive
What is a Textile file?#
A TEXTILE file holds Textile markup, Dean Allen's 2002 lightweight syntax for the Textpattern content management system, using punctuation like *bold*, _italic_ and bq. for a blockquote to generate HTML.
Use Textile when working inside a system that already expects it, such as a Redmine wiki or a long-running Textpattern site.
Convert Textile to Markdown when moving content to a modern platform, since almost everything built in the last decade expects Markdown instead.
What is an ICO file?#
An ICO file packs several copies of the same picture, each a different pixel size and color depth, into one Windows icon container so the operating system can pick whichever copy fits the taskbar, the desktop, or a File Explorer thumbnail.
Use ICO for Windows application icons, desktop shortcuts, and website favicons, where the operating system or browser needs to choose the right size automatically.
Convert ICO to PNG when the image needs to be edited freely, resized to a size the icon doesn't already contain, or used anywhere other than Windows or a browser favicon.
Textile to ICO questions people ask#
What is a Textile file used for?
A Textile file holds plain text written in Textile markup, a lightweight syntax from the early blogging era that's still the default markup in Redmine's wikis and issue tracker. Textile source is written to be converted to HTML, either by Textpattern, Redmine or a standalone library like RedCloth.
Is Textile the same as Markdown?
No. Textile and Markdown are separate lightweight markup languages created around the same time, and their syntax differs throughout, Textile uses codes like h1. for a heading and bq. for a blockquote, where Markdown uses # and >. A file written in one isn't valid in the other.
What software still uses Textile?
Redmine uses Textile as its default wiki and issue-description markup, and it appears in some older installs of Basecamp Classic, Jira and other systems that adopted it during the mid-2000s. Most newer platforms have since standardized on Markdown instead.
What is an ICO file?
An ICO file is the icon format Windows uses for application icons, desktop shortcuts, and browser favicons. Rather than holding a single picture, it bundles multiple versions of the same image at different pixel sizes and color depths so the system can display whichever one fits the context.