Skip newlines and YAML metadata at the beginning of a markdown file

build.sh

@@ -91,7 +91,7 @@ del_files_in_output() {
 
 read_metadata() {
 #	Read the metadata from the top of a .md file into a string
-	metadata=$(awk 'BEGIN{RS = "\n\n"} {print $0}; {exit}' "$1")  # Reads from the .md file until a double-newline is encountered
+	metadata=$(awk 'BEGIN{RS = "\n\n"} ($0 != "") && ($0 !~ /^---/) {print $0; exit}' "$1")  # Reads from the .md file until a double-newline is encountered, as long as 1) the text read is non-empty and 2) it doesn't start with a triple hyphen (the triple hyphen denotes a pandoc metadata block)
 }
 
 convert_to_array() {