**text** in CommonMark marks strong emphasis, usually displayed as bold. It does not, by itself, give an instruction higher priority or make an AI agent more likely to follow it. Whether an instruction file is found and loaded depends on the agent tool; what its formatting means depends on the Markdown parser; and how the agent responds depends on the tool’s behavior.
What does bold mean in Markdown?
CommonMark section 6.4 says that text wrapped in one asterisk or underscore is represented by an HTML <em> element, while text wrapped in two is represented by <strong>. The familiar forms are **phrase** and __phrase__. The specification calls this “strong emphasis”; a browser or other renderer commonly displays it in bold.
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That is a formatting meaning, not a command about authority. The CommonMark definition does not say that strongly emphasized text outranks surrounding instructions. CommonMark Spec, section 6.4
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There is no support in the cited documentation for treating Markdown bold as a priority mechanism or as a reliable way to improve compliance. A claim such as “bold instructions get followed more” should be treated as unverified unless it is tested with controlled evidence for the particular agent, model, version, and setup.
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For Codex, OpenAI describes AGENTS.md files as a way for people to provide instructions or tips, and documents how applicable root and ancestor files are included in the agent’s context. That explains a documented loading path; it does not say that bold markers raise an instruction’s priority. OpenAI Codex: AGENTS.md
How an instruction file reaches an agent
Keep three separate stages in mind when diagnosing behavior:
- Discovery and loading: The host tool determines which instruction files it recognizes and where it looks for them.
- Markdown interpretation: If the content is parsed as Markdown, the parser determines what markers such as
**...**mean. - Agent behavior: The agent processes the loaded content according to the tool’s implementation and instruction handling.
A failure at one stage cannot be fixed simply by changing typography at another. For example, adding bold markers cannot make an unrecognized file name load automatically.
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Use bold as a readability cue when it helps a person scan the file, but make the instruction itself explicit and actionable. For example, **Run the formatter before committing.** is easy to spot; its wording—not the bold formatting—states the requested action.
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The CommonMark tutorial also shows the two-marker forms and explains that a backslash before a marker can prevent it from being interpreted as emphasis. CommonMark Markdown Tutorial: Emphasis
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How do instruction-file conventions differ by tool?
Instruction-file behavior is specific to the agent harness. Check the selected tool’s documentation for the recognized file names and locations, whether loading is automatic or configured, its Markdown behavior, and any documented precedence rules. Microsoft’s VS Code documentation identifies AGENTS.md as the recommended project-instructions format for OpenAI Codex; that does not establish that every agent uses the same format or loading rules. Microsoft: Use custom instructions in VS Code
OpenAI’s Codex base instructions also use bold as a typographic cue for keywords and monospace for literal code or paths. That is a style convention in that document, not evidence that bold has a general behavioral effect. OpenAI Codex base instructions
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