By default, Org-mode doesn’t let you edit things in an indirect buffer except for source blocks.

This package extends org-edit-special so it can be used to edit (almost) any type of block in Org-mode, things like quote, verse, comment blocks, etc.

Installation

It’s on MELPA. Load it using your preferred way.

Doom users:

packages.el:

(package! org-edit-indirect)

config.el:

(use-package! org-edit-indirect
  :hook (org-mode . org-edit-indirect-mode))

Usage

• Move the cursor to any source, verse, comment, quote block; drawer; or a paragraph, headline, property drawer, or a plain list
• <C-c '> (or whatever org-edit-special normally binds to)

Advanced usage

It’s possible to set the major mode of the indirect buffer, based on the type of the block. I didn’t want this package to be too intrusive, so I didn’t implement this feature as part of the package. Here’s an example of how that can be achieved:

(defun edit-indirect-guess-mode-fn+ (parent-buffer beg _end)
  "Guess the major mode for an edit-indirect buffer."
  (let* ((type (with-current-buffer parent-buffer
                 (cond
                  ;; set markdown-mode for quote & verse blocks
                  ((and (eq major-mode 'org-mode)
                        (when-let ((s (save-mark-and-excursion
                                        (goto-char (- beg 1))
                                        (thing-at-point 'symbol))))
                         (string-match-p
                          "+begin_quote\\|+begin_verse" s)))
                   :quote)
                  ;; json-mode for results drawer blocks,
                  ;; src blocks like:
                  ;; #+begin_src sh :results drawer
                  ((and (eq major-mode 'org-mode)
                        (when-let ((s (save-mark-and-excursion
                                        (goto-char (- beg 1))
                                        (backward-word)
                                        (thing-at-point 'word))))
                          (string-match-p "results" s)))
                   :results-drawer)
                  ;; fallback to org-mode for the rest
                  ((eq major-mode 'org-mode) :org-mode)))))
    (cl-case type
      (:quote (markdown-mode))
      (:results-drawer (json-mode))
      (:org-mode (org-mode))
      (t (normal-mode)))))

(setq edit-indirect-guess-mode-function #'edit-indirect-guess-mode-fn+)