---
title: Making Github Flavored Markdown Your Default Grammar in Atom
description: Have you ever wanted new files to default to Markdown syntax?
image: https://resources.mutuallyhuman.com/hubfs/Imported_Blog_Media/atom-editor-screenshot-509fa2f5e6984f0aeadbc7502518c9b070b55beb658a9bc4c90e16e8860f7a0e-1.png
---

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# Making Github Flavored Markdown Your Default Grammar in Atom

By [Zach Dennis](https://resources.mutuallyhuman.com/test/author/zach-dennis) on 17 05 2015

Recently, while mentoring a client product manager, we were exploring a few different tools for writing stories. He'd gotten comfortable with using Pivotal Tracker's interface but had noticed its clunkiness when adding acceptance criteria to the story. So, I showed him [Atom](http://www.atom.io).

He loved it, from the Markdown support and syntax highlighting, to the ability to split panes and preview rendered output.

About an hour after use he asked, "How do I make Markdown the default language selected?" It was one of those *why didn't I think of that* moments.

Here's a working snippet that sets *Github Flavored Markdown* for all unsaved files by default:

### Using a Default Scope Other Than Markdown

If you want to use something other than Markdown as your default, here's a few simple steps to do just that:

First, open up the development console in Atom by hitting Cmd-Alt-i.

Next, run the following JS in the console. It will print out a list of all of the scope names available:

You'll get output that looks like this:

![Atom Editor Screenshot listing scope names](https://resources.mutuallyhuman.com/hubfs/Imported_Blog_Media/atom-editor-screenshot-509fa2f5e6984f0aeadbc7502518c9b070b55beb658a9bc4c90e16e8860f7a0e-1.png)

Lastly, update the `defaultGrammarScopeName` in your init script to the scopeName that you prefer.

And that's it; easy peasy lemon squeezy.

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