05 — Sharing what you wrote
What you will have at the end: a link you can send, and a clear idea of which of the three kinds you just sent.
What you need: a free account (tutorial 01, step 7), and a document worth sending.
The three kinds, before you click anything
This is the part worth understanding first, because the difference is what someone on the other end can do:
| Who can open it | What they get | What it grants | |
|---|---|---|---|
| A private link | Anyone with the link, after you approve them | The document, in the app | A role in your workspace — the one you chose |
| A public link | Anyone with the link | The rendered page. No sign-in, no editing, no raw markdown | Nothing. Ever |
| A searchable page | Anyone at all — search engines find it | The same page, at an address of its own | Nothing. Ever |
The rule to keep: a public link exposes one document; a private link is an invitation to your workspace. They look similar and they are not the same act. The third is the second with the door propped open, and it is a separate tick.
1. Open the share dialog
Open the document you want to send, and click the 🔗 icon in the header above
it, which is there for markdown files once you are signed in — or press
Ctrl+Shift+P and search for share, which reaches any document that is not an
image.
A dialog appears titled Share document, with the file's name under it.
If it tells you "Only a workspace owner or admin can create share links for this document", you are a viewer or editor in someone else's workspace. Ask them.
2. The private link — an invitation
Leave Make public (read-only) unchecked.
Under Grants on approval, pick what the person gets when you let them in:
- Viewer — reads the workspace, comments on it.
- Editor — writes in it, alongside you and everyone else.
- Admin — the above, plus managing the workspace and its share links.
Click Create & copy link — it goes to your clipboard.
Nothing happens until you say so. The person opens the link and requests access; you approve it from the bell in the top bar, or from the workspace's configuration tab, and until you do they have nothing. The link is a doorbell, not a key.
3. The public link — a page, and only a page
Tick Make public (read-only).
The dialog changes, and a Theme option appears — which of the twenty-four themes the page opens in. It defaults to the one you are using. Whoever opens it sees the page in the theme you picked, from the very first paint, whatever their own preferences are.
Click Create & copy link.
What that link gives out: the rendered document and the name of the workspace it came from. Nothing else — no sign-in prompt, no editing, not even the raw markdown, and none of your other documents.
It is a bearer link. Anyone who has it can open it, and can pass it on. If that matters, use a private link instead.
4. Searchable, if you actually want that
Once public is ticked, a second choice appears: Searchable on the web — "Search engines can find this page, and it gets its own address."
It may be greyed out, reading Not available for this account. Publishing a listed page is an entitlement rather than something every account has, and there is no self-serve way to turn it on — so if the tick will not take, that is why and the rest of this section is for later.
Leave it off and the page is reachable only by the link you hand out; the app asks search engines not to index it. Tick it and the document becomes a published page with a readable address of its own, listed in the site's sitemap.
Two things about it that §6 cannot undo:
- Un-ticking it does not take the address back. The slug stays claimed by that document, so re-listing it later lands on the same page.
- The sitemap can keep offering it for up to an hour, so "not searchable" is true of the next crawl rather than of this minute.
5. Check what you sent
Paste your link into a chat app before you send it to anyone. A link unfurls in one of two shapes, and which one you get tells you what you sent:
- A public link shows the document's own title, description and preview image. A searchable page unfurls the same way — it is a public link that has been listed.
- A private link shows a fixed card — "A document shared with you on markdown-den. Sign in to open it." — under the file's name.
So: if you see the document, you sent a page. If you see the sign-in card, you sent an invitation to your workspace. Note what that card also does — it puts the file's name in front of everybody in the chat, whether or not any of them ever gets access.
6. Take it back
Each workspace's live links are listed under Active share links in its settings, where owners and admins can revoke them. Revoking one stops it working immediately, for everyone holding it.
Worth knowing: revoking a public link removes the page. It does not un-send the copies anyone already made of what it said.