Grid tables are dropped from llms-txt output

What happens

When a project sets llms-txt: true, every table this extension generates disappears from the .llms.md output. In place of each table, the output holds the literal string [TABLE].

Why

Quarto builds each .llms.md file from the rendered HTML, not from the source markdown. The conversion runs pandoc -f html -t gfm-raw_html.

gridTable (_extensions/quarto-openapi/lib/markdown.ts:16) emits a Pandoc grid table. The doc comment states the intent:

Grid tables support multi-line cells and are the most flexible table format in Pandoc/Quarto.

Multi-line cells are the problem. A grid table cell that holds block content becomes a <p> or a <ul> in the HTML. A GFM pipe table cannot hold block content in a cell, so pandoc falls back to raw HTML. The -raw_html extension then strips that HTML, and the placeholder is all that remains.

Tables whose cells hold only inline content convert without a problem.

Scale

The Posit Connect API reference uses this extension. Numbers from a full render:

• _site/api/index.html holds 1013 generated tables.
• 879 of those tables have a <p> element inside a cell.
• _site/api/index.llms.md holds 879 [TABLE] placeholders.

The match is exact. Every table with block content in a cell is lost, and the 134 inline-only tables survive. The parameter and schema reference is therefore absent from the llms output.

To reproduce

1. Add llms-txt: true to _quarto.yml.
2. Render a spec that has a parameter whose description holds a paragraph and a bulleted list.
3. Open the generated .llms.md file. The table is now [TABLE].

A typical trigger is a query parameter that documents its accepted values as a list under an introductory paragraph.

Callers

• _extensions/quarto-openapi/lib/schema.ts:175
• _extensions/quarto-openapi/lib/sections.ts:405

Possible directions

The trade-off here is yours to make. Three options:

1. Emit a pipe table when every cell holds inline content, and keep the grid table only when a cell needs blocks. This shrinks the loss but does not remove it.
2. Move list-valued descriptions out of the cell. Render them as a nested or definition list below the table. The HTML then converts cleanly.
3. Keep the HTML table and ask Quarto to retain raw_html for llms output. This needs a change in Quarto, not here.

Option 2 preserves the most information in both outputs, but it changes the rendered HTML layout.

I am glad to test a fix against the Connect reference, which is a large real-world spec.

Start with _extensions/quarto-openapi/lib/markdown.ts:16, then inspect the callers in _extensions/quarto-openapi/lib/schema.ts:175 and _extensions/quarto-openapi/lib/sections.ts:405. Reproduce the issue with llms-txt enabled and a block-content table cell, then verify that the chosen approach preserves the table information in the generated .llms.md output.