Creole File Format (.creole)

A CREOLE file holds Creole markup, a wiki syntax finalized as version 1.0 in 2007 by representatives of major wiki engines meeting at a WikiSym workshop, meant to give MediaWiki, PmWiki, TWiki and others one common syntax that content could move between.

.creoleDocuments

Creole at a glance#

Full name	Creole wiki markup
File extension	.creole
Category	Documents
First released	2007
Compression	Uncompressed
FileFlip support	FileFlip reads this format but does not write it

What a .creole file can hold#

These are the things a Creole file either supports or does not, and they are what decides whether a conversion keeps everything or quietly drops something.

Selectable text	Yes
Human readable	Yes

Strengths and limitations of Creole#

What Creole does well

Deliberately picks the most common syntax across major wiki engines, so content written in it looks familiar in almost any wiki
Bitbucket used Creole 1.0 as its default wiki markup for years, and Moodle still offers it as a syntax option
The specification itself is short enough to read in one sitting, unlike most wiki engines' own markup documentation

Where Creole falls short

Adoption never reached the wikis it was designed to unify; most stayed on their own native syntax
Development froze after the 1.0 release in 2007 to give engines time to implement it, and the format hasn't been revised since
Templates, which drive much of what makes MediaWiki pages complex, are explicitly out of scope

Use Creole for wiki content meant to move between different wiki engines without a full rewrite.

Convert Creole to Markdown when the content is leaving wiki software altogether, since almost nothing outside a wiki engine reads Creole.

How to open a .creole file#

A .creole file opens in the programs below, grouped by the platform you are on. If you would rather not install anything, FileFlip converts Creole into a format your machine already opens, and it does it in the browser tab rather than on a server.

Platform	Programs that open it
Windows	VS Code, Notepad++
macOS	VS Code, Sublime Text
Linux	VS Code, vim
Web	Bitbucket, FileFlip

Creole questions people ask#

What is Creole markup?

Creole is a wiki markup language finalized in 2007 by developers from several wiki engines who met at a WikiSym workshop the year before, with the explicit goal of giving different wikis one common syntax so content could move between them instead of being rewritten each time.

Which wikis use Creole?

Bitbucket used Creole 1.0 as its default wiki markup, and Moodle still offers it as an option for writing content. Most other wiki engines, including MediaWiki itself, kept their own native syntax rather than switching to Creole.

Why didn't Creole replace every wiki's own syntax?

Creole was designed as a common subset that intentionally left out features like templates, so any wiki with an established base of content in its native syntax had little reason to migrate. Development also froze after the 2007 1.0 release to let existing engines catch up, which limited how far it could evolve to compete with what wikis already had.

Converting Creole files#

FileFlip does not write .creole files, so nothing on the site converts into this format. It works as a source only.

Every conversion runs inside your browser. The file is read from your disk, the work happens on your own machine, and nothing is uploaded. How FileFlip works names the engine behind each family and how to verify that for yourself.