This manual, written by Protesilaos Stavrou, describes the customization
options for the Emacs package called denote (or denote.el), and
provides every other piece of information pertinent to it.
The documentation furnished herein corresponds to stable version {{{stable-version}}}, released on {{{release-date}}}. Any reference to a newer feature which does not yet form part of the latest tagged commit, is explicitly marked as such.
Current development target is {{{development-version}}}.
- Package name (GNU ELPA):
denote - Official manual: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote
- Change log: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote-changelog
- Git repo on SourceHut: https://git.sr.ht/~protesilaos/denote
- Mirrors:
- Mailing list: https://lists.sr.ht/~protesilaos/denote
- Backronyms: Denote Everything Neatly; Omit The Excesses. Don’t Ever Note Only The Epiphenomenal.
If you are viewing the README.org version of this file, please note that the GNU ELPA machinery automatically generates an Info manual out of it.
Copyright (C) 2022 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with the Front-Cover Texts being “A GNU Manual,” and with the Back-Cover Texts as in (a) below. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled “GNU Free Documentation License.”
(a) The FSF’s Back-Cover Text is: “You have the freedom to copy and modify this GNU manual.”
Denote aims to be a simple-to-use, focused-in-scope, and effective note-taking tool for Emacs. It is based on the following core design principles:
- Predictability
- File names must follow a consistent and descriptive naming convention (The file-naming scheme). The file name alone should offer a clear indication of what the contents are, without reference to any other metadatum. This convention is not specific to note-taking, as it is pertinent to any form of file that is part of the user’s long-term storage (Renaming files).
- Composability
- Be a good Emacs citizen, by integrating with other
packages or built-in functionality instead of re-inventing functions
such as for filtering or greping. The author of Denote (Protesilaos,
aka “Prot”) writes ordinary notes in plain text (
.txt), switching on demand to an Org file only when its expanded set of functionality is required for the task at hand (Points of entry). - Portability
- Notes are plain text and should remain portable. The way Denote writes file names, the front matter it includes in the note’s header, and the links it establishes must all be adequately usable with standard Unix tools. No need for a database or some specialised software. As Denote develops and this manual is fully fleshed out, there will be concrete examples on how to do the Denote-equivalent on the command-line.
- Flexibility
- Do not assume the user’s preference for a note-taking methodology. Denote is conceptually similar to the Zettelkasten Method, which you can learn more about in this detailed introduction: https://zettelkasten.de/introduction/. Notes are atomic (one file per note) and have a unique identifier. However, Denote does not enforce a particular methodology for knowledge management, such as a restricted vocabulary or mutually exclusive sets of keywords. Denote also does not check if the user writes thematically atomic notes. It is up to the user to apply the requisite rigor and/or creativity in pursuit of their preferred workflow (Writing metanotes).
- Hackability
- Denote’s code base consists of small and reusable functions. They all have documentation strings. The idea is to make it easier for users of varying levels of expertise to understand what is going on and make surgical interventions where necessary (e.g. to tweak some formatting). In this manual, we provide concrete examples on such user-level configurations (Keep a journal or diary).
Now the important part… “Denote” is the familiar word, though it also is a play on the “note” concept. Plus, we can come up with acronyms, recursive or otherwise, of increasingly dubious utility like:
- Don’t Ever Note Only The Epiphenomenal
- Denote Everything Neatly; Omit The Excesses
But we’ll let you get back to work. Don’t Eschew or Neglect your Obligations, Tasks, and Engagements.
There are five ways to write a note with Denote: invoke the denote,
denote-type, denote-date, denote-subdirectory, denote-template
commands, or leverage the org-capture-templates by setting up a
template which calls the function denote-org-capture. We explain all
of those in the subsequent sections.
The denote command will prompt for a title. If a region is active,
the text of the region becomes the default at the minibuffer prompt
(meaning that typing RET without any input will use the default
value). Once the title is supplied, the denote command will then ask
for keywords. The resulting note will have a file name as already
explained: The file naming scheme
The file type of the new note is determined by the user option
denote-file-type (Front matter).
The keywords’ prompt supports minibuffer completion. Available
candidates are those defined in the user option denote-known-keywords.
More candidates can be inferred from the names of existing notes, by
setting denote-infer-keywords to non-nil (which is the case by
default).
Multiple keywords can be inserted by separating them with a comma (or
whatever the value of the crm-separator is—which should be a comma).
When the user option denote-sort-keywords is non-nil (the default),
keywords are sorted alphabetically (technically, the sorting is done
with string-lessp).
The interactive behaviour of the denote command is influenced by the
user option denote-prompts (The denote-prompts option).
The denote command can also be called from Lisp. Read its doc string
for the technicalities.
In the interest of discoverability, denote is also available under the
alias denote-create-note.
The user option denote-prompts determines how the denote command
will behave interactively (Standard note creation).
The value is a list of symbols, which includes any of the following:
title: Prompt for the title of the new note.keywords: Prompts with completion for the keywords of the new note. Available candidates are those specified in the user optiondenote-known-keywords. If the user optiondenote-infer-keywordsis non-nil, keywords in existing note file names are included in the list of candidates. Thekeywordsprompt usescompleting-read-multiple, meaning that it can accept multiple keywords separated by a comma (or whatever the value ofcrm-sepatoris).file-type: Prompts with completion for the file type of the new note. Available candidates are those specified in the user optiondenote-file-type. Without this prompt,denoteuses the value ofdenote-file-type.subdirectory: Prompts with completion for a subdirectory in which to create the note. Available candidates are the value of the user optiondenote-directoryand all of its subdirectories. Any subdirectory must already exist: Denote will not create it.date: Prompts for the date of the new note. It will expect an input like 2022-06-16 or a date plus time: 2022-06-16 14:30. Without thedateprompt, thedenotecommand uses thecurrent-time.The denote-date-prompt-use-org-read-date option.
template: Prompts for a KEY among thedenote-templates. The value of that KEY is used to populate the new note with content, which is added after the front matter (The denote-templates option).
The prompts occur in the given order.
If the value of this user option is nil, no prompts are used. The
resulting file name will consist of an identifier (i.e. the date and
time) and a supported file type extension (per denote-file-type).
Recall that Denote’s standard file-naming scheme is defined as follows (The file-naming scheme):
DATE--TITLE__KEYWORDS.EXT
If either or both of the title and keywords prompts are not
included in the value of this variable, file names will be any of
those permutations:
DATE.EXT DATE--TITLE.EXT DATE__KEYWORDS.EXT
When in doubt, always include the title and keywords prompts.
Finally, this user option only affects the interactive use of the
denote command (advanced users can call it from Lisp). For ad-hoc
interactive actions that do not change the default behaviour of the
denote command, users can invoke these convenience commands:
denote-type, denote-subdirectory, denote-date. They are described
in the subsequent section (Convenience commands for note creation).
The user option denote-templates is an alist of content templates for
new notes. A template is arbitrary text that Denote will add to a newly
created note right below the front matter.
Templates are expressed as a (KEY . STRING) association.
- The
KEYis the name which identifies the template. It is an arbitrary symbol, such asreport,memo,statement. - The
STRINGis ordinary text that Denote will insert as-is. It can contain newline characters to add spacing. Below we show some concrete examples.
The user can choose a template either by invoking the command
denote-template or by changing the user option denote-prompts to
always prompt for a template when calling the denote command.
The denote-prompts option.
Convenience commands for note creation.
Templates can be written directly as one large string. For example (the
\n character is read as a newline):
(setq denote-templates
'((report . "* Some heading\n\n* Another heading")
(memo . "* Some heading
* Another heading
")))Long strings may be easier to type but interpret indentation literally.
Also, they do not scale well. A better way is to use some Elisp code to
construct the string. This would typically be the concat function,
which joins multiple strings into one. The following is the same as the
previous example:
(setq denote-templates
`((report . "* Some heading\n\n* Another heading")
(memo . ,(concat "* Some heading"
"\n\n"
"* Another heading"
"\n\n"))))Notice that to evaluate a function inside of an alist we use the
backtick to quote the alist (NOT the straight quote) and then prepend a
comma to the expression that should be evaluated. The concat form
here is not sensitive to indentation, so it is easier to adjust for
legibility.
DEV NOTE: We do not provide more examples at this point, though feel welcome to ask for help if the information provided herein is not sufficient. We shall expand the manual accordingly.
Sometimes the user needs to create a note that has different
requirements from those of denote (Standard note creation). While
this can be achieved globally by changing the denote-prompts user
option, there are cases where an ad-hoc method is the appropriate one
(The denote-prompts option).
To this end, Denote provides the following convenience interactive commands for note creation:
- Create note by specifying file type
- The
denote-typecommand creates a note while prompting for a file type.This is the equivalent to calling
denotewhendenote-promptsis set to'(file-type title keywords). In practical terms, this lets you produce, say, a note in Markdown even though you normally write in Org (Standard note creation).The
denote-create-note-using-typeis an alias ofdenote-type. - Create note using a date
- Normally, Denote reads the current date
and time to construct the unique identifier of a newly created note
(Standard note creation). Sometimes, however, the user needs to set
an explicit date+time value.
This is where the
denote-datecommand comes in. It creates a note while prompting for a date. The date can be in YEAR-MONTH-DAY notation like2022-06-30or that plus the time:2022-06-16 14:30.The denote-date-prompt-use-org-read-date option.
This is the equivalent to calling
denotewhendenote-promptsis set to'(date title keywords).The
denote-create-note-using-dateis an alias ofdenote-date. - Create note in a specific directory
- The
denote-subdirectorycommand creates a note while prompting for a subdirectory. Available candidates include the value of the variabledenote-directoryand any subdirectory thereof (Denote does not create subdirectories).This is equivalent to calling
denotewhendenote-promptsis set to'(subdirectory title keywords).The
denote-create-note-in-subdirectoryis a more descriptive alias ofdenote-subdirectory. - Create note and add a template
- The
denote-templatecommand creates a new note and inserts the specified template below the front matter (The denote-templates option). Available candidates for templates are specified in the user optiondenote-templates.This is equivalent to calling
denotewhendenote-promptsis set to'(template title keywords).The
denote-create-note-with-templateis an alias of the commanddenote-template, meant to help with discoverability.
The convenience commands we provide only cover some basic use-cases (Convenience commands for note creation). The user may require combinations that are not covered, such as to prompt for a template and for a subdirectory, instead of only one of the two. To this end, we show how to follow the code we use in Denote to write your own variants of those commands.
First let’s take a look at the definition of one of those commands.
They all look the same, but we use denote-subdirectory for this
example:
(defun denote-subdirectory ()
"Create note while prompting for a subdirectory.
Available candidates include the value of the variable
`denote-directory' and any subdirectory thereof.
This is equivalent to calling `denote' when `denote-prompts' is
set to '(subdirectory title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(subdirectory title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote)))The hyphenated word after defun is the name of the function. It has
to be unique. Then we have the documentation string (or “doc string”)
which is for the user’s convenience.
This function is interactive, meaning that it can be called via M-x
or be assigned to a key binding. Then we have the local binding of the
denote-prompts to the desired combination (“local” means specific to
this function without affecting other contexts). Lastly, it calls the
standard denote command interactively, so it uses all the prompts in
their specified order.
Now let’s say we want to have a command that (i) asks for a template and
(ii) for a subdirectory (The denote-templates option). All we need to
do is tweak the let bound value of denote-prompts and give our
command a unique name:
;; Like `denote-subdirectory' but also ask for a template
(defun denote-subdirectory-with-template ()
"Create note while also prompting for a template and subdirectory.
This is equivalent to calling `denote' when `denote-prompts' is
set to '(template subdirectory title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(template subdirectory title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote)))The tweaks to denote-prompts determine how the command will behave
(The denote-prompts option). Use this paradigm to write your own
variants which you can then assign to keys or invoke with M-x.
By default, Denote uses its own simple prompt for date or date+time
input (The denote-prompts option). This is done when the
denote-prompts option includes a date symbol and/or when the user
invokes the denote-date command.
Users who want to benefit from the more advanced date selection method
that is common in interactions with Org mode, can set the user option
denote-date-prompt-use-org-read-date to a non-nil value.
The commands denote-keywords-add and denote-keywords-remove
streamline the process of interactively updating a file’s keywords in
the front matter and renaming it accordingly.
The denote-keywords-add asks for keywords using the familiar
minibuffer prompt (Standard note creation). It then renames the file
(Rename a single file based on its front matter).
Similarly, the denote-keywords-remove removes one or more keywords
from the list of existing keywords and then renames the file
accordingly.
For integration with org-capture, the user must first add the relevant
template. Such as:
(with-eval-after-load 'org-capture
(add-to-list 'org-capture-templates
'("n" "New note (with Denote)" plain
(file denote-last-path)
#'denote-org-capture
:no-save t
:immediate-finish nil
:kill-buffer t
:jump-to-captured t)))[ In the future, we might develop Denote in ways which do not require such manual intervention. More user feedback is required to identify the relevant workflows. ]
Once the template is added, it is accessed from the specified key. If,
for instance, org-capture is bound to C-c c, then the note creation
is initiated with C-c c n, per the above snippet. After that, the
process is the same as with invoking denote directly, namely: a prompt
for a title followed by a prompt for keywords (Standard note creation).
Users may prefer to leverage org-capture in order to extend file
creation with the specifiers described in the org-capture-templates
documentation (such as to capture the active region and/or create a
hyperlink pointing to the given context).
IMPORTANT. Due to the particular file-naming scheme of Denote, which is
derived dynamically, such specifiers or other arbitrary text cannot be
written directly in the template. Instead, they have to be assigned to
the user option denote-org-capture-specifiers, which is interpreted by
the function denote-org-capture. Example with our default value:
(setq denote-org-capture-specifiers "%l\n%i\n%?")Note that denote-org-capture ignores the denote-file-type: it always
sets the Org file extension for the created note to ensure that the
capture process works as intended, especially for the desired output of
the denote-org-capture-specifiers.
The user option denote-directory accepts a value that represents the
path to a directory, such as ~/Documents/notes. Normally, the user
will have one place where they store all their notes, in which case this
arrangement shall suffice.
There is, however, the possibility to maintain separate directories of notes. By “separate”, we mean that they do not communicate with each other: no linking between them, no common keywords, nothing. Think of the scenario where one set of notes is for private use and another is for an employer. We call these separate directories “silos”.
To create silos, the user must specify a local variable at the root of
the desired directory. This is done by creating a .dir-locals.el
file, with the following contents:
;;; Directory Local Variables. For more information evaluate:
;;;
;;; (info "(emacs) Directory Variables")
((nil . ((denote-directory . default-directory))))When inside the directory that contains this .dir-locals.el file, all
Denote commands/functions for note creation, linking, the inference of
available keywords, et cetera will use the silo as their point of
reference. They will not read the global value of denote-directory.
The global value of denote-directory is read everywhere else except
the silos.
In concrete terms, this is a representation of the directory structures
(notice the .dir-locals.el file is needed only for the silos):
;; This is the global value of 'denote-directory' (no need for a .dir-locals.el) ~/Documents/notes |-- 20210303T120534--this-is-a-test__journal_philosophy.txt |-- 20220303T120534--another-sample__journal_testing.md `-- 20220620T181255--the-third-test__keyword.org ;; A silo with notes for the employer ~/different/path/to/notes-for-employer |-- .dir-locals.el |-- 20210303T120534--this-is-a-test__conference.txt |-- 20220303T120534--another-sample__meeting.md `-- 20220620T181255--the-third-test__keyword.org ;; Another silo with notes for my volunteering ~/different/path/to/notes-for-volunteering |-- .dir-locals.el |-- 20210303T120534--this-is-a-test__activism.txt |-- 20220303T120534--another-sample__teambuilding.md `-- 20220620T181255--the-third-test__keyword.org
It is possible to configure other user options of Denote to have a
silo-specific value. For example, this one changes the
denote-known-keywords only for this particular silo:
;;; Directory Local Variables. For more information evaluate:
;;;
;;; (info "(emacs) Directory Variables")
((nil . ((denote-directory . default-directory)
(denote-known-keywords . ("food" "drink")))))This one is like the above, but also disables denote-infer-keywords:
;;; Directory Local Variables. For more information evaluate:
;;;
;;; (info "(emacs) Directory Variables")
((nil . ((denote-directory . default-directory)
(denote-known-keywords . ("food" "drink"))
(denote-infer-keywords . nil))))To expand the list of local variables to, say, cover specific major modes, we can do something like this:
;;; Directory Local Variables. For more information evaluate:
;;;
;;; (info "(emacs) Directory Variables")
((nil . ((denote-directory . default-directory)
(denote-known-keywords . ("food" "drink"))
(denote-infer-keywords . nil)))
(org-mode . ((org-hide-emphasis-markers . t)
(org-hide-macro-markers . t)
(org-hide-leading-stars . t))))IMPORTANT If your silo contains sub-directories of notes, you
should replace default-directory in the above examples with an
absolute path to your silo directory, otherwise links from files
within the sub-directories cannot be made to files in the parent
directory. For example:
;;; Directory Local Variables. For more information evaluate:
;;;
;;; (info "(emacs) Directory Variables")
((nil . ((denote-directory . "~/my-silo")
(denote-known-keywords . ("food" "drink"))
(denote-infer-keywords . nil)))
(org-mode . ((org-hide-emphasis-markers . t)
(org-hide-macro-markers . t)
(org-hide-leading-stars . t))))As not all user options have a “safe” local value, Emacs will ask the
user to confirm their choice and to store it in the Custom code
snippet that is normally appended to init file (or added to the file
specified by the user option custom-file).
Finally, it is possible to have a .dir-locals.el for subdirectories
of any denote-directory. Perhaps to specify a different set of
known keywords, while not making the subdirectory a silo in its own
right. We shall not expand on such an example, as we trust the user
to experiment with the best setup for their workflow.
Feel welcome to ask for help if the information provided herein is not sufficient. The manual shall be expanded accordingly.
The user option denote-excluded-directories-regexp instructs all
Denote functions that read or check file/directory names to omit
directories that match the given regular expression. The regexp needs
to match only the name of the directory, not its full path.
Affected operations include file prompts and functions that return the
available files in the value of the user option denote-directory
(Maintain separate directory silos for notes).
File prompts are used by several commands, such as denote-link and
denote-subdirectory.
Functions that check for files include denote-directory-files and
denote-directory-subdirectories.
The match is performed with string-match-p.
For developers or advanced users.
The user option denote-excluded-keywords-regexp omits keywords that
match a regular expression from the list of inferred keywords.
Keywords are inferred from file names and provided at relevant prompts
as completion candidates when the user option denote-infer-keywords
is non-nil.
The match is performed with string-match-p.
Denote provides commands to rename files and update their front matter where relevant. For Denote to work, only the file name needs to be in order, by following our naming conventions (The file-naming scheme). The linking mechanism, in particular, needs just the identifier in the file name (Linking notes).
We write front matter in notes for the user’s convenience and for other tools to make use of that information (e.g. Org’s export mechanism). The renaming mechanism takes care to keep this data in sync with the file name, when the user performs a change.
Renaming is useful for managing existing files created with Denote, but also for converting older text files to Denote notes.
Lastly, Denote’s file-naming scheme is not specific to notes or text files: it is useful for all sorts of items, such as multimedia and PDFs that form part of the user’s longer-term storage. While Denote does not manage such files (e.g. doesn’t create links to them), it already has all the mechanisms to facilitate the task of renaming them.
The denote-rename-file command renames a file and updates existing
front matter if appropriate.
If in Dired, the FILE to be renamed is the one at point, else the
command prompts with minibuffer completion for a target file.
If FILE has a Denote-compliant identifier, retain it while updating
the TITLE and KEYWORDS fields of the file name. Else create an
identifier based on the following conditions:
- If
FILEdoes not have an identifier and optionalDATEis non-nil (such as with a prefix argument), invoke the functiondenote-prompt-for-date-return-id. It prompts for a date and uses it to derive the identifier. - If
FILEdoes not have an identifier and optionalDATEis nil (this is the case without a prefix argument), use the file attributes to determine the last modified date and format it as an identifier. - As a fallback, derive an identifier from the current time.
The default TITLE is retrieved from a line starting with a title field
in the file’s contents, depending on the given file type (Front matter).
Else, the file name is used as a default value at the minibuffer prompt.
As a final step after the FILE, TITLE, and KEYWORDS prompts, ask
for confirmation, showing the difference between old and new file names.
For example:
Rename sample.txt to 20220612T052900--my-sample-title__testing.txt? (y or n)
The file type extension (e.g. .txt) is read from the underlying file
and is preserved through the renaming process. Files that have no
extension are simply left without one.
Renaming only occurs relative to the current directory. Files are not moved between directories.
If the FILE has Denote-style front matter for the TITLE and
KEYWORDS, this command asks to rewrite their values in order to
reflect the new input (this step always requires confirmation and the
underlying buffer is not saved, so consider invoking
diff-buffer-with-file to double-check the effect). The rewrite of the
FILE and KEYWORDS in the front matter should not affect the rest of
the block.
If the file doesn’t have front matter but is among the supported file
types (per denote-file-type), the denote-rename-file command adds
front matter at the top of it and leaves the buffer unsaved for further
inspection.
This command is intended to (i) rename existing Denote notes while updating their title and keywords in the front matter, (ii) convert existing supported file types to Denote notes, and (ii) rename non-note files (e.g. PDF) that can benefit from Denote’s file-naming scheme. The latter is a convenience we provide, since we already have all the requisite mechanisms in place (though Denote does not—and will not—manage such files).
The denote-dired-rename-marked-files command renames marked files in
Dired to conform with our file-naming scheme. The operation does the
following:
- the file’s existing file name is retained and becomes the
TITLEfield, per Denote’s file-naming scheme; - the
TITLEis sluggified and downcased, per our conventions; - an identifier is prepended to the
TITLE; - the file’s extension is retained;
- a prompt is asked once for the
KEYWORDSfield and the input is applied to all file names; - if the file is recognized as a Denote note, this command adds or
rewrites front matter to include the new keywords. A confirmation to
carry out this step is performed once at the outset. Note that the
affected buffers are not saved. The user can thus check them to
confirm that the new front matter does not cause any problems
(e.g. with the command
diff-buffer-with-file). Multiple buffers can be saved withsave-some-buffers(read its doc string). The addition of front matter takes place only if the given file has the appropriate file type extension (per the user optiondenote-file-type).
In the previous section, we covered the more general mechanism of the
command denote-rename-file (Rename a single file). There is also a
way to have the same outcome by making Denote read the data in the
current file’s front matter and use it to construct/update the file
name. The command for this is denote-rename-file-using-front-matter.
It is only relevant for files that (i) are among the supported file
types, per denote-file-type, and (ii) have the requisite front matter
in place.
Suppose you have an .org file with this front matter (Front matter):
#+title: My sample note file #+date: [2022-08-05 Fri 13:10] #+filetags: :testing: #+identifier: 20220805T131044
Its file name reflects this information:
20220805T131044--my-sample-note-file__testing.org
You want to change its title and keywords manually, so you modify it thus:
#+title: My modified sample note file #+date: [2022-08-05 Fri 13:10] #+filetags: :testing:denote:emacs: #+identifier: 20220805T131044
The file name still shows the old title and keywords. So after saving
the buffer, you invoke denote-rename-file-using-front-matter and it
updates the file name to:
20220805T131044--my-modified-sample-note-file__testing_denote_emacs.org
The renaming is subject to a “yes or no” prompt that shows the old and new names, just so the user is certain about the change.
If called interactively with a prefix argument C-u or from Lisp with
a non-nil AUTO-CONFIRM argument, this “yes or no” prompt is skipped.
The identifier of the file, if any, is never modified even if it is edited in the front matter: Denote considers the file name to be the source of truth in this case, to avoid potential breakage with typos and the like.
As already noted, Denote can rename a file based on the data in its
front matter (Rename a single file based on its front matter). The
command denote-dired-rename-marked-files-using-front-matter extends
this principle to a batch operation which applies to all marked files in
Dired.
Marked files must count as notes for the purposes of Denote, which means
that they at least have an identifier in their file name and use a
supported file type, per denote-file-type. Files that do not meet
this criterion are ignored.
The operation does the following:
- the title in the front matter becomes the
TITLEcomponent of the file name (The file-naming scheme); - the keywords in the front matter are used for the
KEYWORDScomponent of the file name and are processed accordingly, if needed; - the identifier remains unchanged in the file name even if it is modified in the front matter (this is done to avoid breakage caused by typos and the like).
NOTE that files must be saved, because Denote reads from the underlying file, not a modified buffer (this is done to avoid potential mistakes). The return value of a modified buffer is the one prior to the modification, i.e. the one already written on disk.
This command is useful for synchronizing multiple file names with their respective front matter.
Notes are stored the denote-directory. The default path is
~/Documents/notes. The denote-directory can be a flat listing,
meaning that it has no subdirectories, or it can be a directory tree.
Either way, Denote takes care to only consider “notes” as valid
candidates in the relevant operations and will omit other files or
directories.
Every note produced by Denote follows this pattern (Points of entry):
DATE--TITLE__KEYWORDS.EXTENSION
The DATE field represents the date in year-month-day format followed
by the capital letter T (for “time”) and the current time in
hour-minute-second notation. The presentation is compact:
20220531T091625. The DATE serves as the unique identifier of each
note.
The TITLE field is the title of the note, as provided by the user. It
automatically gets downcased and hyphenated. An entry about “Economics
in the Euro Area” produces an economics-in-the-euro-area string for
the TITLE of the file name.
The KEYWORDS field consists of one or more entries demarcated by an
underscore (the separator is inserted automatically). Each keyword is a
string provided by the user at the relevant prompt which broadly
describes the contents of the entry. Keywords that need to be more than
one-word-long must be written with hyphens: any other character, such as
spaces or the plus sign is automatically converted into a hyphen. So
when emacs_library appears in a file name, it is interpreted as two
distinct keywords, whereas emacs-library is one keyword. This is
reflected in how the keywords are recorded in the note (Front matter).
While Denote supports multi-word keywords by default, the user option
denote-allow-multi-word-keywords can be set to nil to forcibly join
all words into one, meaning that an input of word1 word2 will be
written as word1word2.
The EXTENSION is the file type. By default, it is .org (org-mode)
though the user option denote-file-type provides support for Markdown
with YAML or TOML variants (.md which runs markdown-mode) and plain
text (.txt via text-mode). Consult its doc string for the minutiae.
While files end in the .org extension by default, the Denote code base
does not actually depend on org.el and/or its accoutrements.
Examples:
20220610T043241--initial-thoughts-on-the-zettelkasten-method__notetaking.org 20220610T062201--define-custom-org-hyperlink-type__denote_emacs_package.md 20220610T162327--on-hierarchy-and-taxis__notetaking_philosophy.txt
The different field separators, namely -- and __ introduce an
efficient way to anchor searches (such as with Emacs commands like
isearch or from the command-line with find and related). A query
for _word always matches a keyword, while a regexp in the form of,
say, "\\([0-9T]+?\\)--\\(.*?\\)_" captures the date in group \1 and
the title in \2 (test any regular expression in the current buffer by
invoking M-x re-builder).
Features of the file-naming scheme for searching or filtering.
While Denote is an Emacs package, notes should work long-term and not depend on the functionality of a specific program. The file-naming scheme we apply guarantees that a listing is readable in a variety of contexts.
Denote has to be highly opinionated about which characters can be used
in file names and the file’s front matter in order to enforce its
file-naming scheme. The private variable denote--punctuation-regexp
holds the relevant value. In simple terms:
- What we count as “illegal characters” are converted into hyphens.
- Input for a file title is hyphenated and downcased. The original value is preserved in the note’s contents (Front matter).
- Keywords should not have spaces or other delimiters. If they do, they are converted into hyphens. Keywords are always downcased.
File names have three fields and two sets of field delimiters between them:
DATE--TITLE__KEYWORDS.EXTENSION
The first field delimiter is the double hyphen, while the second is the double underscore. These practically serve as anchors for easier searching. Consider this example:
20220621T062327--introduction-to-denote__denote_emacs.txt
You will notice that there are two matches for the word denote: one in
the title field and another in the keywords’ field. Because of the
distinct field delimiters, if we search for -denote we only match the
first instance while _denote targets the second one. When sorting
through your notes, this kind of specificity is invaluable—and you get
it for free from the file names alone!
Users can get a lot of value out of this simple arrangement, even if
they have no knowledge of regular expressions. One thing to consider,
for maximum effect, is to avoid using multi-word keywords as those get
hyphenated like the title and will thus interfere with the above: either
set the user option denote-allow-multi-word-keywords to nil or simply
insert single words at the relevant prompts.
Notes have their own “front matter”. This is a block of data at the top of the file, with no empty lines between the entries, which is automatically generated at the creation of a new note. The front matter includes the title and keywords (aka “tags” or “filetags”, depending on the file type) which the user specified at the relevant prompt, as well as the date and unique identifier, which are derived automatically.
This is how it looks for Org mode (when denote-file-type is nil or the
org symbol):
#+title: This is a sample note #+date: [2022-06-30 Thu 16:09] #+filetags: :denote:testing: #+identifier: 20220630T160934
For Markdown with YAML (denote-file-type has the markdown-yaml
value), the front matter looks like this:
--- title: "This is a sample note" date: 2022-06-30T16:09:58+03:00 tags: ["denote", "testing"] identifier: "20220630T160958" ---
For Markdown with TOML (denote-file-type has the markdown-toml
value), it is:
+++ title = "This is a sample note" date = 2022-06-30T16:10:13+03:00 tags = ["denote", "testing"] identifier = "20220630T161013" +++
And for plain text (denote-file-type has the text value), we have
the following:
title: This is a sample note date: 2022-06-30 tags: denote testing identifier: 20220630T161028 ---------------------------
The format of the date in the front matter is controlled by the user
option denote-date-format. When nil, Denote uses a file-type-specific
format:
- For Org, an inactive timestamp is used, such as
[2022-06-30 Wed 15:31]. - For Markdown, the RFC3339 standard is applied:
2022-06-30T15:48:00+03:00. - For plain text, the format is that of ISO 8601:
2022-06-30.
If the value is a string, ignore the above and use it instead. The
string must include format specifiers for the date. These are described
in the doc string of format-time-string..
Per Denote’s design principles, the code is hackable. All front matter is stored in variables that are intended for public use. We do not declare those as “user options” because (i) they expect the user to have some degree of knowledge in Emacs Lisp and (ii) implement custom code.
[ NOTE for tinkerers: code intended for internal use includes double hyphens in its symbol. “Internal use” means that it can be changed without warning and with no further reference in the change log. Do not use any of it without understanding the consequences. ]
The variables which hold the front matter format are:
denote-org-front-matter
denote-text-front-matter
denote-toml-front-matter
denote-yaml-front-matter
These variables have a string value with specifiers that are used by the
format function. The formatting operation passes four arguments which
include the values of the given entries. If you are an advanced user
who wants to edit this variable to affect how front matter is produced,
consider using something like %2$s to control where the Nth argument
is placed.
When editing the value, make sure to:
- Not use empty lines inside the front matter block.
- Insert at least one empty line after the front matter block and do not use any empty line before it.
These help with consistency and might prove useful if we ever need to operate on the front matter as a whole.
With those granted, below are some examples. The approach is the same for all variables.
;; Like the default, but upcase the entries
(setq denote-org-front-matter
"#+TITLE: %s
#+DATE: %s
#+FILETAGS: %s
#+IDENTIFIER: %s
\n")
;; Change the order (notice the %N$s notation)
(setq denote-org-front-matter
"#+title: %1$s
#+filetags: %3$s
#+date: %2$s
#+identifier: %4$s
\n")
;; Remove the date
(setq denote-org-front-matter
"#+title: %1$s
#+filetags: %3$s
#+identifier: %4$s
\n")
;; Remove the date and the identifier
(setq denote-org-front-matter
"#+title: %1$s
#+filetags: %3$s
\n")Note that setq has a global effect: it affects the creation of all new
notes. Depending on the workflow, it may be preferrable to have a
custom command which let binds the different format. We shall not
provide examples at this point as this is a more advanced feature and we
are not yet sure what the user’s needs are. Please provide feedback and
we shall act accordingly.
Sometimes the user needs to produce new front matter for an existing
note. Perhaps because they accidentally deleted a line and could not
undo the operation. The command denote-add-front-matter can be used
for this very purpose.
In interactive use, denote-add-front-matter must be invoked from a
buffer that visits a Denote note. It prompts for a title and then for
keywords. These are the standard prompts we already use for note
creation, so the keywords’ prompt allows minibuffer completion and the
input of multiple entries, each separated by a comma (Points of entry).
The newly created front matter is added to the top of the file.
This command does not rename the file (e.g. to update the keywords). To
rename a file by reading its front matter as input, the user can rely on
denote-rename-file-using-front-matter (Renaming files).
Note that denote-add-front-matter is useful only for existing Denote
notes. If the user needs to convert a generic text file to a Denote
note, they can use one of the command which first rename the file to
make it comply with our file-naming scheme and then add the relevant
front matter.
Denote offers several commands for linking between notes.
All links target files which are Denote notes. This means that they
have our file-naming scheme, are writable/regular (not directory, named
pipe, etc.), and use the appropriate file type extension (per
denote-file-type). Furthermore, the files need to be inside the
denote-directory or one of its subdirectories. No other file is
recognised.
The following sections delve into the details.
The denote-link command inserts a link at point to an entry specified
at the minibuffer prompt. Links are formatted depending on the file
type of current note. In Org and plain text buffers, links are
formatted thus: [[denote:IDENTIFIER][TITLE]]. While in Markdown they
are expressed as [TITLE](denote:IDENTIFIER).
When denote-link is called with a prefix argument (C-u by default),
it formats links like [[denote:IDENTIFIER]]. The user might prefer
its simplicity.
The description of the link is taken from the target file’s front
matter or, if that is not available, from the file name. If the
region is active, its text is used as the link’s description instead.
If the active region has no text, the inserted link used just the
identifier, as with the C-u prefix mentioned above.
Inserted links are automatically buttonized and remain active for as
long as the buffer is available. In Org this is handled by the major
mode: the denote: hyperlink type works exactly like the standard
file:. In Markdown and plain text, Denote performs the buttonization
of those links. To buttonize links in existing files while visiting
them, the user must add this snippet to their setup (it already excludes
Org):
(add-hook 'find-file-hook #'denote-link-buttonize-buffer)The denote-link-buttonize-buffer is also an interactive function in
case the user needs it.
Links are created only for files which qualify as a “note” for our purposes (Linking notes).
Links are styled with the denote-faces-link face, which looks exactly
like an ordinary link by default. This is just a convenience for the
user/theme in case they want denote: links to remain distinct from
other links.
The command denote-link-add-links adds links at point matching a
regular expression or plain string. The links are inserted as a
typographic list, such as:
- link1 - link2 - link3
Each link is formatted according to the file type of the current note,
as explained further above about the denote-link command. The current
note is excluded from the matching entries (adding a link to itself is
pointless).
When called with a prefix argument (C-u) denote-link-add-links will
format all links as [[denote:IDENTIFIER]], hence a typographic list:
- [[denote:IDENTIFIER-1]] - [[denote:IDENTIFIER-2]] - [[denote:IDENTIFIER-3]]
Same examples of a regular expression that can be used with this command:
journalmatch all files which includejournalanywhere in their name._journalmatch all files which includejournalas a keyword.^2022.*_journalmatch all file names starting with2022and including the keywordjournal.\.txtmatch all files including.txt. In practical terms, this only applies to the file extension, as Denote automatically removes dots (and other characters) from the base file name.
If files are created with denote-sort-keywords as non-nil (the
default), then it is easy to write a regexp that includes multiple
keywords in alphabetic order:
_denote.*_packagematch all files that include both thedenoteandpackagekeywords, in this order.\(.*denote.*package.*\)\|\(.*package.*denote.*\)is the same as above, but out-of-order.
Remember that regexp constructs only need to be escaped once (like \|)
when done interactively but twice when called from Lisp. What we show
above is for interactive usage.
Links are created only for files which qualify as a “note” for our purposes (Linking notes).
As a variation on the denote-link-add-links command, one may wish to
only include ‘missing links’, i.e. links that are not yet present in
the current file.
This can be achieved with denote-link-add-missing-links. The command
is similar to denote-link-add-links, but will only include links to
notes that are not yet linked to (Insert links matching a regexp).
The command denote-link-dired-marked-notes is similar to
denote-link-add-links in that it inserts in the buffer a typographic
list of links to Denote notes (Insert links matching a regexp). Though
instead of reading a regular expression, it lets the user mark files in
Dired and link to them. This should be easier for users of all skill
levels, instead of having to write a potentially complex regular
expression.
If there are multiple buffers that visit a Denote note, this command will ask to select one among them, using minibuffer completion. If there is only one buffer, it will operate in it outright. If there are no buffers, it will produce an error.
With optional ID-ONLY as a prefix argument (C-u by default), the
command inserts links with just the identifier, which is the same
principle as with denote-link and others (Adding a single link).
The command denote-link-dired-marked-notes is meant to be used from a
Dired buffer.
As always, links are created only for files which qualify as a “note” for our purposes (Linking notes).
In one’s note-taking workflow, there may come a point where they are expounding on a certain topic but have an idea about another subject they would like to link to (Linking notes). The user can always rely on the other linking facilities we have covered herein to target files that already exist. Though they may not know whether they already have notes covering the subject or whether they would need to write new ones. To this end, Denote provides two convenience commands:
denote-link-after-creating- Create new note in the background and
link to it directly.
Use
denoteinteractively to produce the new note. Its doc string or this manual explains which prompts will be used and under what conditions (Standard note creation).With optional
ID-ONLYas a prefix argument (this is theC-ukey, by default) create a link that consists of just the identifier. Else try to also include the file’s title. This has the same meaning as indenote-link(Adding a single link).IMPORTANT NOTE: Normally,
denotedoes not save the buffer it produces for the new note. This is a safety precaution to not write to disk unless the user wants it (e.g. the user may choose to kill the buffer, thus cancelling the creation of the note). However, for this command the creation of the note happens in the background and the user may miss the step of saving their buffer. We thus have to save the buffer in order to (i) establish valid links, and (ii) retrieve whatever front matter from the target file.
denote-link-or-create- Use
denote-linkonTARGETfile, creating it if necessary.If
TARGETfile does not exist, calldenote-link-after-creatingwhich runs thedenotecommand interactively to create the file. The established link will then be targeting that new file.If
TARGETfile does not exist, add the user input that was used to search for it to the history of thedenote-title-prompt. The user can then retrieve and possibly further edit their last input, using it as the newly created note’s actual title. At thedenote-title-prompttypeM-pwith the default key bindings, which callsprevious-history-element.With optional
ID-ONLYas a prefix argument create a link with just the file’s identifier. This has the same meaning as indenote-link.This command has the alias
denote-link-to-existing-or-new-note, which helps with discoverability.
The command denote-link-backlinks produces a bespoke buffer which
displays backlinks to the current note. A “backlink” is a link back
to the present entry.
By default, the backlinks’ buffer is desinged to display the file name of the note linking to the current entry. Each file name is presented on its own line, like this:
Backlinks to "On being honest" (20220614T130812) ------------------------------------------------ 20220614T145606--let-this-glance-become-a-stare__journal.txt 20220616T182958--feeling-butterflies-in-your-stomach__journal.txt
When the user option denote-backlinks-show-context is non-nil, the
backlinks’ buffer displays the line on which a link to the current
note occurs. It also shows multiple occurances, if present. It looks
like this (and has the appropriate fontification):
Backlinks to "On being honest" (20220614T130812) ------------------------------------------------ 20220614T145606--let-this-glance-become-a-stare__journal.txt 37: growing into it: [[denote:20220614T130812][On being honest]]. 64: As I said in [[denote:20220614T130812][On being honest]] I have never 20220616T182958--feeling-butterflies-in-your-stomach__journal.txt 62: indifference. In [[denote:20220614T130812][On being honest]] I alluded
Note that the width of the lines in the context depends on the
underlying file. In the above example, the lines are split at the
fill-column. Long lines will show up just fine. Also note that the
built-in user option xref-truncation-width can truncate long lines
to a given maximum number of characters.
Speed up backlinks’ buffer creation?
The backlinks’ buffer runs the major-mode denote-backlinks-mode. It
binds keys to move between links with n (next) and p (previous).
These are stored in the denote-backlinks-mode-map (use M-x
describe-mode (C-h m) in an unfamiliar buffer to learn more about
it). When the user option denote-backlinks-show-context is non-nil,
all relevant Xref key bindings are fully functional: again, check
describe-mode.
The backlinking facility uses Emacs’ built-in Xref infrastructure. On some operating systems, the user may need to add certain executables to the relevant environment variable.
Why do I get “Search failed with status 1” when I search for backlinks?
Backlinks to the current file can also be visited by using the
minibuffer completion interface with the denote-link-find-backlink
command (Visiting linked files via the minibuffer).
The placement of the backlinks’ buffer is subject to the user option
denote-link-backlinks-display-buffer-action. Due to the nature of the
underlying display-buffer mechanism, this inevitably is a relatively
advanced feature. By default, the backlinks’ buffer is displayed below
the current window. The doc string of our user option includes a sample
configuration that places the buffer in a left side window instead.
Reproducing it here for the sake of convenience:
(setq denote-link-backlinks-display-buffer-action
'((display-buffer-reuse-window
display-buffer-in-side-window)
(side . left)
(slot . 99)
(window-width . 0.3)))A “metanote” is an entry that describes other entries who have something in common. Writing metanotes can be part of a workflow where the user periodically reviews their work in search of patterns and deeper insights. For example, you might want to read your journal entries from the past year to reflect on your experiences, evolution as a person, and the like.
The commands denote-link-add-links, denote-link-dired-marked-notes
are suited for this task.
Insert links matching a regexp.
Insert links from marked files in Dired.
You will create your metanote the way you use Denote ordinarily
(metanotes may have the metanote keyword, among others), write an
introduction or however you want to go about it, invoke the command
which inserts multiple links at once (see the above-cited nodes), and
continue writing.
Metanotes can serve as entry points to groupings of individual notes. They are not the same as a filtered list of files, i.e. what you would do in Dired or the minibuffer where you narrow the list of notes to a given query. Metanotes contain the filtered list plus your thoughts about it. The act of purposefully grouping notes together and contemplating on their shared patterns is what adds value.
Your future self will appreciate metanotes for the function they serve in encapsulating knowledge, while current you will be equipped with the knowledge derived from the deliberate self-reflection.
Denote has a major-mode-agnostic mechanism to collect all linked file
references in the current buffer and return them as an appropriately
formatted list. This list can then be used in interactive commands.
The denote-link-find-file is such a command. It uses minibuffer
completion to visit a file that is linked to from the current note. The
candidates have the correct metadata, which is ideal for integration
with other standards-compliant tools (Extending Denote). For instance,
a package such as marginalia will display accurate annotations, while
the embark package will be able to work its magic such as in exporting
the list into a filtered Dired buffer (i.e. a familiar Dired listing
with only the files of the current minibuffer session).
To visit backlinks to the current note via the minibuffer, use
denote-link-find-backlink. This is an alternative to placing
backlinks in a dedicated buffer (The backlinks’ buffer).
For convenience, the denote-link command has an alias called
denote-link-insert-link. The denote-link-backlinks can also be used
as denote-link-show-backlinks-buffer. While denote-link-add-links
is aliased denote-link-insert-links-matching-regexp. The purpose of
these aliases is to offer alternative, more descriptive names of select
commands.
One of the upsides of Denote’s file-naming scheme is the predictable
pattern it establishes, which appears as a near-tabular presentation in
a listing of notes (i.e. in Dired). The denote-dired-mode can help
enhance this impression, by fontifying the components of the file name
to make the date (identifier) and keywords stand out.
There are two ways to set the mode. Either use it for all directories, which probably is not needed:
(add-hook 'dired-mode-hook #'denote-dired-mode)Or configure the user option denote-dired-directories and then set up
the function denote-dired-mode-in-directories:
;; We use different ways to specify a path for demo purposes.
(setq denote-dired-directories
(list denote-directory
(thread-last denote-directory (expand-file-name "attachments"))
(expand-file-name "~/Documents/vlog")))
(add-hook 'dired-mode-hook #'denote-dired-mode-in-directories)The faces we define for this purpose are:
denote-faces-datedenote-faces-delimiterdenote-faces-extensiondenote-faces-keywordsdenote-faces-subdirectorydenote-faces-timedenote-faces-title
For the time being, the diredfl package is not compatible with this
facility.
The denote-dired-mode does not only fontify note files that were
created by Denote: it covers every file name that follows our naming
conventions (The file-naming scheme). This is particularly useful for
scenaria where, say, one wants to organise their collection of PDFs and
multimedia in a systematic way (and, perhaps, use them as attachments
for the notes Denote produces if you are writing Org notes and are using
its standand attachments’ facility).
Denote can optionally integrate with Org mode’s “dynamic blocks” facility. Start by loading the relevant library:
;; Register Denote's Org dynamic blocks
(require 'denote-org-dblock)A dynamic block gets its contents by evaluating a given function,
depending on the type of block. The type of block and its parameters
are stated in the opening #+BEGIN line of the block. Typing C-c C-c
with point on that line runs the function, with the given arguments,
and populates the block’s contents accordingly.
Denote leverages Org dynamic blocks to streamline the inclusion of (i)
links to notes whose name matches a given search query (like
denote-link-add-links) and (ii) backlinks to the current note (similar to
denote-link-find-backlink).
These two types of blocks are named denote-links and denote-backlinks
respectively. The latter does not accept any parameters, while the
former does, which we explain below by also demonstrating how dynamic
blocks are written.
A dynamic block looks like this:
#+BEGIN: denote-links :regexp "_journal"
:
#+END:
Here we have the denote-links type, with the :regexp parameter.
The value of the :regexp parameter is the same as that of the
command denote-link-add-links (Insert links matching a regexp). The
linked entry provides practical examples of patterns that make good
use of Denote’s file-naming scheme (The file-naming scheme).
In this example, we instruct Org to produce a list of all notes that
include the journal keyword in their file name (keywords in file
names are prefixed with the underscore). So the following:
#+BEGIN: denote-links :regexp "_journal"
:
#+END:
Becomes something like this once we type C-c C-c with point on the
#+BEGIN line (Org makes the links look prettier by default):
#+BEGIN: denote-links :regexp "_journal" - [[denote:20220616T182958][Feeling butterflies in your stomach]] - [[denote:20220818T221036][Between friend and stranger]] #+END:
The dynamic block takes care to keep the list in order and to add any missing links when the block is evaluated anew.
Depending on one’s workflow, the dynamic block can be instructed to
list only those links which are missing from the current buffer
(similar to denote-link-add-missing-links). Adding the :missing-only
parameter with a non-~nil~ value achieves this effect. The #+BEGIN line
looks like this:
#+BEGIN: denote-links :regexp "_journal" :missing-only t
To reverse the order links appear in, add :reverse t to the
#+BEGIN line.
The denote-links block can also accept a :block-name parameter
with a string value that names the block. Once the dynamic block is
evaluated, a #+NAME is prepended to the block’s contents. This can
be referenced in other source blocks to parse the named block’s
contents as input of another process. The details are beyond the
scope of Denote.
As for the denote-backlinks dynamic block type, it simply produces a
list of notes that link to the current file. It accepts no parameters
and looks like this:
#+BEGIN: denote-backlinks
:
#+END:
The Org manual describes the technicalities of Dynamic Blocks. Evaluate:
(info "(org) Dynamic Blocks")Dynamic blocks are particularly useful for metanote entries that reflect on the status of earlier notes (Writing metanotes).
Denote has a dedicated minibuffer history for each one of its prompts.
This practically means that using M-p (previous-history-element) and
M-n (next-history-element) will only cycle through the relevant
record of inputs, such as your latest titles in the TITLE prompt, and
keywords in the KEYWORDS prompt.
The built-in savehist library saves minibuffer histories. Sample
configuration:
(require 'savehist)
(setq savehist-file (locate-user-emacs-file "savehist"))
(setq history-length 500)
(setq history-delete-duplicates t)
(setq savehist-save-minibuffer-history t)
(add-hook 'after-init-hook #'savehist-mode)Denote is a tool with a narrow scope: create notes and link between them, based on the aforementioned file-naming scheme. For other common operations the user is advised to rely on standard Emacs facilities or specialised third-party packages. This section covers the details.
While there are subtle technical differences between a journal and a diary, we will consider those equivalent in the interest of brevity: they both describe a personal space that holds a record of your thoughts about your experiences and/or view of events in the world.
Suppose you are committed to writing an entry every day. Unlike what we
demonstrated before, your writing will follow a regular naming pattern.
You know that the title of the new note must always look like Tuesday
14 June 2022 and the keyword has to be journal or diary. As such,
you want to automate the task instead of being prompted each time, as is
the norm with denote and the relevant commands (Points of entry).
This is easy to accomplish because denote can be called from Lisp and
given the required arguments of TITLE and KEYWORDS directly. All
you need is a simple wrapper function:
(defun my-denote-journal ()
"Create an entry tagged 'journal' with the date as its title."
(interactive)
(denote
(format-time-string "%A %e %B %Y") ; format like Tuesday 14 June 2022
'("journal"))) ; multiple keywords are a list of strings: '("one" "two")By invoking my-denote-journal you will go straight into the newly
created note and commit to your writing outright.
Of course, you can always set up the function so that it asks for a
TITLE but still automatically applies the journal tag:
(defun denote-journal-with-title ()
"Create an entry tagged 'journal', while prompting for a title."
(interactive)
(denote
(denote--title-prompt) ; ask for title, instead of using human-readable date
'("journal")))Sometimes journaling is done with the intent to hone one’s writing skills. Perhaps you are learning a new language or wish to communicate your ideas with greater clarity and precision. As with everything that requires a degree of sophistication, you have to work for it—write, write, write!
One way to test your progress is to set a timer. It helps you gauge
your output and its quality. To use a timer with Emacs, consider the
tmr package:
(defun my-denote-journal-with-tmr ()
"Like `my-denote-journal', but also set a 10-minute timer.
The `tmr' command is part of the `tmr' package."
(interactive)
(denote
(format-time-string "%A %e %B %Y")
'("journal"))
(tmr "10" "Practice writing in my journal")) ; set 10 minute timer with a descriptionOnce the timer elapses, stop writing and review your performance. Practice makes perfect!
[ As Denote matures, we may add hooks to control what happens before or after the creation of a new note. We shall also document more examples of tasks that can be accomplished with this package. ]
Sources for tmr:
- Package name (GNU ELPA):
tmr - Official manual: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/tmr
- Change log: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote-changelog
- Git repo on SourceHut: https://git.sr.ht/~protesilaos/tmr
- Mirrors:
- GitHub: https://github.com/protesilaos/tmr
- GitLab: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/tmr
- Mirrors:
- Mailing list: https://lists.sr.ht/~protesilaos/tmr
Sometimes it makes sense to gather notes in a single file and later
review it to make multiple notes out of it. With the following code,
the user marks a region and then invokes the command
my-denote-create-new-note-from-region: it prompts for a title and
keywords and then uses the region’s contents to fill in the newly
created note.
(defun my-denote-create-new-note-from-region (beg end)
"Create note whose contents include the text between BEG and END.
Prompt for title and keywords of the new note."
(interactive "r")
(if-let (((region-active-p))
(text (buffer-substring-no-properties beg end)))
(progn
(denote (denote--title-prompt) (denote--keywords-prompt))
(insert text))
(user-error "No region is available")))Have a different workflow? Feel welcome to discuss it in any of our official channels (Contributing).
With Org files in particular, it is common to have nested headings
which could be split off into their own standalone notes. In Org
parlance, an entry with all its subheadings is a “subtree”. With the
following code, the user places the point inside the heading they want
to split off and invokes the command my-denote-org-extract-subtree.
It will create a note using the heading’s text and tags for the new
file. The contents of the subtree become the contents of the new note
and are removed from the old one.
(defun my-denote-org-extract-subtree ()
"Create new Denote note using current Org subtree.
Make the new note use the Org file type, regardless of the value
of `denote-file-type'.
Use the subtree title as the note's title. If available, use the
tags of the heading are used as note keywords.
Delete the original subtree."
(interactive)
(if-let ((text (org-get-entry))
(heading (org-get-heading :no-tags :no-todo :no-priority :no-comment)))
(progn
(delete-region (org-entry-beginning-position) (org-entry-end-position))
(denote heading (org-get-tags) 'org)
(insert text))
(user-error "No subtree to extract; aborting")))Have a different workflow? Feel welcome to discuss it in any of our official channels (Contributing).
Emacs’ standard file manager (or directory editor) can read a regular
expression to mark the matching files. This is the command
dired-mark-files-regexp, which is bound to % m by default. For
example, % m _denote will match all files that have the denote
keyword (Features of the file-naming scheme for searching or filtering).
Once the files are matched, the user has to options: (i) narrow the list to the matching items or (ii) exclude the matching items from the list.
For the former, we want to toggle the marks by typing t (calls the
command dired-toggle-marks by default) and then hit the letter k
(for dired-do-kill-lines). The remaining files are those that match
the regexp that was provided earlier.
For the latter approach of filtering out the matching items, simply
involves the use of the k command (dired-do-kill-lines) to omit the
marked files from the list.
These sequences can be combined to incrementally narrow the list. Note
that dired-do-kill-lines does not delete files: it simply hides them
from the current view.
Revert to the original listing with g (revert-buffer).
For a convenient wrapper, consider this example:
(defvar prot-dired--limit-hist '()
"Minibuffer history for `prot-dired-limit-regexp'.")
;;;###autoload
(defun prot-dired-limit-regexp (regexp omit)
"Limit Dired to keep files matching REGEXP.
With optional OMIT argument as a prefix (\\[universal-argument]),
exclude files matching REGEXP.
Restore the buffer with \\<dired-mode-map>`\\[revert-buffer]'."
(interactive
(list
(read-regexp
(concat "Files "
(when current-prefix-arg
(propertize "NOT " 'face 'warning))
"matching PATTERN: ")
nil 'prot-dired--limit-hist)
current-prefix-arg))
(dired-mark-files-regexp regexp)
(unless omit (dired-toggle-marks))
(dired-do-kill-lines))Emacs’ Dired is a powerful file manager that builds its functionality
on top of the Unix ls command. As noted elsewhere in this manual,
the user can update the ls flags that Dired uses to display its
contents (I want to sort by last modified, why won’t Denote let me?).
What Dired cannot do is parse the output of a result that is produced
by piped commands, such as ls -l | sort -t _ -k2. This specific
example targets the second underscore-separated field of the file
name, per our conventions (The file-naming scheme). Conceretely, it
matches the “alpha” as the sorting key in something like this:
20220929T200432--testing-file-one__alpha.txtConsider then, how Dired will sort those files by their identifier:
20220929T200432--testing-file-one__alpha.txt
20220929T200532--testing-file-two__beta.txt
20220929T200632--testing-file-three__alpha.txt
20220929T200732--testing-file-four__beta.txtWhereas on the command line, we can get the following:
$ ls | sort -t _ -k 2 20220929T200432--testing-file-one__alpha.txt 20220929T200632--testing-file-three__alpha.txt 20220929T200532--testing-file-two__beta.txt 20220929T200732--testing-file-four__beta.txt
This is where dired-virtual-mode shows its utility. If we tweak our
command-line invocation to include ls -l, this mode can behave like
Dired on the listed files. (We omit the output of the -l flag from
this tutorial, as it is too verbose.)
What we now need is to capture the output of ls -l | sort -t _ -k 2
in an Emacs buffer and then enable dired-virtual-mode. To do that,
we can rely on either M-x shell or M-x eshell and then manually
copy the relevant contents.
For the user’s convenience, I share what I have for Eshell to quickly capture the last command’s output in a dedicated buffer:
(defcustom prot-eshell-output-buffer "*Exported Eshell output*"
"Name of buffer with the last output of Eshell command.
Used by `prot-eshell-export'."
:type 'string
:group 'prot-eshell)
(defcustom prot-eshell-output-delimiter "* * *"
"Delimiter for successive `prot-eshell-export' outputs.
This is formatted internally to have newline characters before
and after it."
:type 'string
:group 'prot-eshell)
(defun prot-eshell--command-prompt-output ()
"Capture last command prompt and its output."
(let ((beg (save-excursion
(goto-char (eshell-beginning-of-input))
(goto-char (point-at-bol)))))
(when (derived-mode-p 'eshell-mode)
(buffer-substring-no-properties beg (eshell-end-of-output)))))
;;;###autoload
(defun prot-eshell-export ()
"Produce a buffer with output of the last Eshell command.
If `prot-eshell-output-buffer' does not exist, create it. Else
append to it, while separating multiple outputs with
`prot-eshell-output-delimiter'."
(interactive)
(let ((eshell-output (prot-eshell--command-prompt-output)))
(with-current-buffer (get-buffer-create prot-eshell-output-buffer)
(let ((inhibit-read-only t))
(goto-char (point-max))
(unless (eq (point-min) (point-max))
(insert (format "\n%s\n\n" prot-eshell-output-delimiter)))
(goto-char (point-at-bol))
(insert eshell-output)
(switch-to-buffer-other-window (current-buffer))))))Bind prot-eshell-export to a key in the eshell-mode-map and give
it a try (I use C-c C-e). In the produced buffer, activate the
dired-virtual-mode.
embark is a remarkable package that lets you perform relevant,
context-dependent actions using a prefix key (simplifying in the
interest of brevity).
For our purposes, Embark can be used to produce a Dired listing directly
from the minibuffer. Suppose the current note has links to three other
notes. You might use the denote-link-find-file command to pick one
via the minibuffer. But why not turn those three links into their own
Dired listing? While in the minibuffer, invoke embark-act which you
may have already bound to C-. and then follow it up with E (for the
embark-export command).
This pattern can be repeated with any list of candidates, meaning that you can narrow the list by providing some input before eventually exporting the results with Embark.
Overall, this is very powerful and you might prefer it over doing the same thing directly in Dired, since you also benefit from all the power of the minibuffer (Narrow the list of files in Dired).
Emacs provides built-in commands which are wrappers of standard Unix
tools: M-x grep lets the user input the flags of a grep call and
pass a regular expression to the -e flag.
The author of Denote uses this thin wrapper instead:
(defvar prot-search--grep-hist '()
"Input history of grep searches.")
;;;###autoload
(defun prot-search-grep (regexp &optional recursive)
"Run grep for REGEXP.
Search in the current directory using `lgrep'. With optional
prefix argument (\\[universal-argument]) for RECURSIVE, run a
search starting from the current directory with `rgrep'."
(interactive
(list
(read-from-minibuffer (concat (if current-prefix-arg
(propertize "Recursive" 'face 'warning)
"Local")
" grep for PATTERN: ")
nil nil nil 'prot-search--grep-hist)
current-prefix-arg))
(unless grep-command
(grep-compute-defaults))
(if recursive
(rgrep regexp "*" default-directory)
(lgrep regexp "*" default-directory)))Rather than maintain custom code, consider using the excellent consult
package: it provides commands such as consult-grep and consult-find
which provide live results and are generally easier to use than the
built-in commands.
Part of the reason Denote does not reinvent existing functionality is to encourage you to learn more about Emacs. You do not need a bespoke “jump to my notes” directory because such commands do not scale well. Will you have a “jump to my downloads” then another for multimedia and so on? No.
Emacs has a built-in framework for recording persistent markers to
locations. Visit the denote-directory (or any dir/file for that
matter) and invoke the bookmark-set command (bound to C-x r m by
default). It lets you create a bookmark.
The list of bookmarks can be reviewed with the bookmark-bmenu-list
command (bound to C-x r l by default). A minibuffer interface is
available with bookmark-jump (C-x r b).
If you use the consult package, its default consult-buffer command
has the means to group together buffers, recent files, and bookmarks.
Each of those types can be narrowed to with a prefix key. The package
consult-dir is an extension to consult which provides useful extras
for working with directories, including bookmarks.
Peter Prevos has produced the citar-denote package which makes it
possible to write notes on BibTeX entries with the help of the citar
package. These notes have the citation’s unique key associated with
them in the file’s front matter. They also get a configurable keyword
in their file name, making it easy to find them in Dired and/or
retrieve them with the various Denote methods.
With citar-denote, the user leverages standard minibuffer completion
mechanisms (e.g. with the help of the vertico and embark packages)
to manage bibliographic notes and access those notes with ease. The
package’s documentation covers the details: https://github.com/pprevos/citar-denote/.
If you are already using consult (which is a brilliant package), you
will probably like its consult-notes extension. It uses the familiar
mechanisms of Consult to filter searches via a prefix key. For example:
(setq consult-notes-sources
`(("Notes" ?n ,denote-directory)
("Books" ?b "~/Documents/books")))With the above, M-x consult-notes will list the files in those two
directories. If you type n and space, it narrows the list to just the
notes, while b does the same for books.
To search all your notes with grep (or ripgrep if installed – see
consult-notes-use-rg variable) use the command
consult-notes-search-in-all-notes. This will employ grep/ripgrep for
searching terms in all the directories set in consult-notes-sources.
Note that consult-notes is in its early stages of development.
Expect improvements in the near future (written on 2022-06-22 16:48
+0300).
Emacs has a built-in library for treating a directory tree as a
“project”. This means that the contents of this tree are seen as part
of the same set, so commands like project-switch-to-buffer (C-x p b
by default) will only consider buffers in the current project
(e.g. three notes that are currently being visited).
Normally, a “project” is a directory tree whose root is under version
control. For our purposes, all you need is to navigate to the
denote-directory (for the shell or via Dired) and use the command-line
to run this (requires the git executable):
git init
From Dired, you can type M-! which invokes dired-smart-shell-command
and then run the git call there.
The project can then be registered by invoking any project-related
command inside of it, such as project-find-file (C-x p f).
It is a good idea to keep your notes under version control, as that
gives you a history of changes for each file. We shall not delve into
the technicalities here, though suffice to note that Emacs’ built-in
version control framework or the exceptionally well-crafted magit
package will get the job done (VC can work with other backends besides
Git).
The command denote-open-or-create prompts to visit a file in the
denote-directory. If the user input does not have any matches,
denote-open-or-create will call the denote command interactively.
It will then use whatever prompts denote normally has, per the user
option denote-prompts (Standard note creation).
To speed up the process or to maintain variants that suit one’s
workflow, we provide these ready-to-use commands that one can add to
their Emacs init file. They can be assigned to key bindings or be used
via M-x after they have been evaluated.
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-open-or-create-with-date ()
"Invoke `denote-open-or-create' but also prompt for date.
The date can be in YEAR-MONTH-DAY notation like 2022-06-30 or
that plus the time: 2022-06-16 14:30. When the user option
`denote-date-prompt-use-org-read-date' is non-nil, the date
prompt uses the more powerful Org+calendar system.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-open-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(date title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(date title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-open-or-create)))
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-open-or-create-with-type ()
"Invoke `denote-open-or-create' but also prompt for file type.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-open-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(type title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(type title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-open-or-create)))
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-open-or-create-with-subdirectory ()
"Invoke `denote-open-or-create' but also prompt for subdirectory.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-open-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(subdirectory title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(subdirectory title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-open-or-create)))
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-open-or-create-with-template ()
"Invoke `denote-open-or-create' but also prompt for template.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-open-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(template title keywords).
For templates, refer to `denote-templates'."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(template title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-open-or-create)))The command denote-link-or-create uses denote-link on a TARGET
file, creating it if necessary. The TARGET matches the user input at
a minibuffer prompt: it is a file in the denote-directory.
If TARGET file does not exist, The denote-link-or-create calls
denote-link-after-creating which runs the standard denote command
interactively to create the file (Standard note creation). The
established link will then be targeting that new file.
When called with an optional prefix argument (C-u by default)
denote-link-or-create creates a link that consists of just the
identifier. Else it tries to also include the file’s title. This has
the same meaning as in denote-link (Linking notes).
To speed up the process or to maintain variants that suit one’s
workflow, we provide these ready-to-use commands that one can add to
their Emacs init file. They can be assigned to key bindings or be used
via M-x after they have been evaluated.
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-link-or-create-with-date ()
"Invoke `denote-link-or-create' but also prompt for date.
The date can be in YEAR-MONTH-DAY notation like 2022-06-30 or
that plus the time: 2022-06-16 14:30. When the user option
`denote-date-prompt-use-org-read-date' is non-nil, the date
prompt uses the more powerful Org+calendar system.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-link-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(date title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(date title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-link-or-create)))
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-link-or-create-with-type ()
"Invoke `denote-link-or-create' but also prompt for file type.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-link-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(type title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(type title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-link-or-create)))
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-link-or-create-with-subdirectory ()
"Invoke `denote-link-or-create' but also prompt for subdirectory.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-link-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(subdirectory title keywords)."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(subdirectory title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-link-or-create)))
;;;###autoload
(defun denote-link-or-create-with-template ()
"Invoke `denote-link-or-create' but also prompt for template.
This is the equivalent to calling `denote-link-or-create' when
`denote-prompts' is set to \\='(template title keywords).
For templates, refer to `denote-templates'."
(declare (interactive-only t))
(interactive)
(let ((denote-prompts '(template title keywords)))
(call-interactively #'denote-link-or-create)))The package is available as denote. Simply do:
M-x package-refresh-contents M-x package-install
And search for it.
GNU ELPA provides the latest stable release. Those who prefer to follow the development process in order to report bugs or suggest changes, can use the version of the package from the GNU-devel ELPA archive. Read: https://protesilaos.com/codelog/2022-05-13-emacs-elpa-devel/.
Assuming your Emacs files are found in ~/.emacs.d/, execute the
following commands in a shell prompt:
cd ~/.emacs.d
# Create a directory for manually-installed packages
mkdir manual-packages
# Go to the new directory
cd manual-packages
# Clone this repo, naming it "denote"
git clone https://git.sr.ht/~protesilaos/denote denoteFinally, in your init.el (or equivalent) evaluate this:
;; Make Elisp files in that directory available to the user.
(add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/manual-packages/denote")Everything is in place to set up the package.
(require 'denote)
;; Remember to check the doc strings of those variables.
(setq denote-directory (expand-file-name "~/Documents/notes/"))
(setq denote-known-keywords '("emacs" "philosophy" "politics" "economics"))
(setq denote-infer-keywords t)
(setq denote-sort-keywords t)
(setq denote-file-type nil) ; Org is the default, set others here
(setq denote-prompts '(title keywords))
(setq denote-excluded-directories-regexp nil)
(setq denote-excluded-keywords-regexp nil)
;; Pick dates, where relevant, with Org's advanced interface:
(setq denote-date-prompt-use-org-read-date t)
;; Read this manual for how to specify `denote-templates'. We do not
;; include an example here to avoid potential confusion.
;; We allow multi-word keywords by default. The author's personal
;; preference is for single-word keywords for a more rigid workflow.
(setq denote-allow-multi-word-keywords t)
(setq denote-date-format nil) ; read doc string
;; By default, we do not show the context of links. We just display
;; file names. This provides a more informative view.
(setq denote-backlinks-show-context t)
;; Also see `denote-link-backlinks-display-buffer-action' which is a bit
;; advanced.
;; If you use Markdown or plain text files (Org renders links as buttons
;; right away)
(add-hook 'find-file-hook #'denote-link-buttonize-buffer)
;; We use different ways to specify a path for demo purposes.
(setq denote-dired-directories
(list denote-directory
(thread-last denote-directory (expand-file-name "attachments"))
(expand-file-name "~/Documents/books")))
;; Generic (great if you rename files Denote-style in lots of places):
;; (add-hook 'dired-mode-hook #'denote-dired-mode)
;;
;; OR if only want it in `denote-dired-directories':
(add-hook 'dired-mode-hook #'denote-dired-mode-in-directories)
;; Here is a custom, user-level command from one of the examples we
;; showed in this manual. We define it here and add it to a key binding
;; below.
(defun my-denote-journal ()
"Create an entry tagged 'journal', while prompting for a title."
(interactive)
(denote
(denote--title-prompt)
'("journal")))
;; Denote DOES NOT define any key bindings. This is for the user to
;; decide. For example:
(let ((map global-map))
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n j") #'my-denote-journal) ; our custom command
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n n") #'denote)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n N") #'denote-type)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n d") #'denote-date)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n s") #'denote-subdirectory)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n t") #'denote-template)
;; If you intend to use Denote with a variety of file types, it is
;; easier to bind the link-related commands to the `global-map', as
;; shown here. Otherwise follow the same pattern for `org-mode-map',
;; `markdown-mode-map', and/or `text-mode-map'.
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n i") #'denote-link) ; "insert" mnemonic
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n I") #'denote-link-add-links)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n b") #'denote-link-backlinks)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n f f") #'denote-link-find-file)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n f b") #'denote-link-find-backlink)
;; Note that `denote-rename-file' can work from any context, not just
;; Dired bufffers. That is why we bind it here to the `global-map'.
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n r") #'denote-rename-file)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c n R") #'denote-rename-file-using-front-matter))
;; Key bindings specifically for Dired.
(let ((map dired-mode-map))
(define-key map (kbd "C-c C-d C-i") #'denote-link-dired-marked-notes)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c C-d C-r") #'denote-dired-rename-marked-files)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c C-d C-R") #'denote-dired-rename-marked-files-using-front-matter))
(with-eval-after-load 'org-capture
(setq denote-org-capture-specifiers "%l\n%i\n%?")
(add-to-list 'org-capture-templates
'("n" "New note (with denote.el)" plain
(file denote-last-path)
#'denote-org-capture
:no-save t
:immediate-finish nil
:kill-buffer t
:jump-to-captured t)))
;; Also check the commands `denote-link-after-creating',
;; `denote-link-or-create'. You may want to bind them to keys as well.Denote is in a stable state and can be relied upon as the basis for custom extensions. Further below is a list with the functions or variables we provide for public usage. Those are in addition to all user options and commands that are already documented in the various sections of this manual.
In this context “public” is any form with single hyphens in its symbol,
such as denote-directory-files. We expressly support those, meaning
that we consider them reliable and commit to documenting any changes in
their particularities (such as through make-obsolete, a record in the
change log, a blog post on the maintainer’s website, and the like).
By contradistinction, a “private” form is declared with two hyphens in
its symbol such as denote--file-extension. Do not use those as we
might change them without further notice.
- Variable
denote-id-format - Format of ID prefix of a note’s filename. The note’s ID is derived from the date and time of its creation (The file-naming scheme).
- Variable
denote-id-regexp - Regular expression to match
denote-id-format.
- Variable
denote-title-regexp - Regular expression to match the TITLE field in a file name (The file-naming scheme).
- Variable
denote-keywords-regexp - Regular expression to match the KEYWORDS field in a file name (The file-naming scheme).
- Variable
denote-excluded-punctuation-regexp - Punctionation that is removed from file names. We consider those characters illegal for our purposes.
- Variable
denote-excluded-punctuation-extra-regexp - Additional
punctuation that is removed from file names. This variable is for
advanced users who need to extend the
denote-excluded-punctuation-regexp. Once we have a better understanding of what we should be omitting, we will update things accordingly.
- Function
denote-file-is-note-p - Return non-nil if
FILEis an actual Denote note. For our purposes, a note must not be a directory, must satisfyfile-regular-p, its path must be part of the variabledenote-directory, it must have a Denote identifier in its name, and use one of the extensions implied bydenote-file-type.
- Function
denote-file-has-identifier-p - Return non-nil if
FILEhas a Denote identifier.
- Function
denote-file-has-supported-extension-p - Return non-nil
if
FILEhas supported extension. Also account for the possibility of an added.gpgsuffix. Supported extensions are those implied bydenote-file-type.
- Function
denote-file-is-writable-and-supported-p - Return non-nil
if
FILEis writable and has supported extension.
- Function
denote-keywords - Return appropriate list of keyword
candidates. If
denote-infer-keywordsis non-nil, infer keywords from existing notes and combine them into a list withdenote-known-keywords. Else use only the latter set of keywords (Standard note creation).
- Function
denote-keywords-sort - Sort
KEYWORDSifdenote-sort-keywordsis non-nil.KEYWORDSis a list of strings, perdenote-keywords-prompt.
- Function
denote-directory - Return path of the variable
denote-directoryas a proper directory, also because it accepts a directory-local value for what we internally refer to as “silos” (Maintain separate directories for notes).
- Function
denote-directory-files - Return list of absolute file
paths in variable
denote-directory. Files only need to have an identifier. The return value may thus include file types that are not implied bydenote-file-type. To limit the return value to text files, use the functiondenote-directory-text-only-files. Remember that thedenote-directoryaccepts a directory-local value (Maintain separate directories for notes).
- Function
denote-directory-text-only-files - Return list of text
files in variable
denote-directory. Filterdenote-directory-filesusingdenote-file-is-note-p.
- Function
denote-directory-subdirectories - Return list of
subdirectories in variable
denote-directory. Omit dotfiles (such as .git) unconditionally. Also exclude whatever matchesdenote-excluded-directories-regexp. Note that thedenote-directoryaccepts a directory-local value for what we call “silos” (Maintain separate directories for notes).
- Function
denote-directory-files-matching-regexp - Return list of
files matching
REGEXPindenote-directory-files.
- Function
denote-file-name-relative-to-denote-directory - Return
name of
FILErelative to the variabledenote-directory.FILEmust be an absolute path.
- Function
denote-get-path-by-id - Return absolute path of
IDstring indenote-directory-files.
- Function
denote-barf-duplicate-id - Throw a
user-errorifIDENTIFIERalready exists.
- Function
denote-sluggify - Make
STRan appropriate slug for file names and related (Sluggified title and keywords).
- Function
denote-sluggify-and-join - Sluggify
STRwhile joining separate words.
- Function
denote-desluggify - Upcase first char in
STRand dehyphenateSTR, invertingdenote-sluggify. Basically, convertthis-is-a-testtoThis is a test.
- Function
denote-sluggify-keywords - Sluggify
KEYWORDS, which is a list of strings (Sluggified title and keywords).
- Function
denote-filetype-heuristics - Return likely file type of
FILE. Use the file extension to detect the file type of the file.If more than one file type correspond to this file extension, use the first file type for which the key-title-kegexp matches in the file or, if none matches, use the first type with this file extension in
denote-file-type.If no file types in
denote-file-typeshas the file extension, the file type is assumed to be the first ofdenote-file-types.
- Function
denote-format-file-name - Format file name.
PATH,ID,KEYWORDS,TITLE-SLUGare expected to be supplied bydenoteor equivalent: they will all be converted into a single string.EXTENSIONis the file type extension, as a string.
- Function
denote-extract-keywords-from-path - Extract keywords
from
PATHand return them as a list of strings.PATHmust be a Denote-style file name where keywords are prefixed with an underscore. IfPATHhas no such keywords, which is possible, return nil (The file-naming scheme).
- Function
denote-extract-id-from-string - Return existing Denote
identifier in
STRING, else nil.
- Function
denote-retrieve-filename-identifier - Extract identifier
from
FILEname. To return an existing identifier or create a new one, refer to thedenote-retrieve-or-create-file-identifierfunction.
- Function
denote-retrieve-or-create-file-identifier - Return
FILEidentifier, generating one if appropriate. The conditions are as follows:- If
FILEhas an identifier, return it. - If
FILEdoes not have an identifier and optionalDATEis non-nil, invokedenote-prompt-for-date-return-id. - If
FILEdoes not have an identifier and DATE is nil, use the file attributes to determine the last modified date and format it as an identifier. - As a fallback, derive an identifier from the current time.
To only return an existing identifier, refer to the function
denote-retrieve-filename-identifier. - If
- Function
denote-retrieve-filename-title - Extract title from
FILEname, else returnfile-name-base. Rundenote-desluggifyon the title if the extraction is successful.
- Function
denote-retrieve-title-value - Return title value from
FILEfront matter perFILE-TYPE.
- Function
denote-retrieve-title-line - Return title line from
FILEfront matter perFILE-TYPE.
- Function
denote-retrieve-keywords-value - Return keywords value
from
FILEfront matter perFILE-TYPE.
- Function
denote-retrieve-keywords-line - Return keywords line
from
FILEfront matter perFILE-TYPE.
- Function
denote-file-prompt - Prompt for file with identifier in
variable
denote-directory. With optionalINITIAL-TEXT, use it to prepopulate the minibuffer.
- Function
denote-keywords-prompt - Prompt for one or more
keywords. In the case of multiple entries, those are separated by
the
crm-sepator, which typically is a comma. In such a scenario, the output is sorted withstring-lessp. To sort the return value, usedenote-keywords-sort.
- Function
denote-title-prompt - Read file title for
denote. With optionalDEFAULT-TITLEuse it as the default value.
- Function
denote-file-type-prompt - Prompt for
denote-file-type. Note that a non-nil value other thantext,markdown-yaml, andmarkdown-tomlfalls back to an Org file type. We useorghere for clarity.
- Function
denote-date-prompt - Prompt for date, expecting
YYYY-MM-DDor that plusHH:MM(or evenHH:MM:SS). Use Org’s more advanced date selection utility if the user optiondenote-date-prompt-use-org-read-dateis non-nil. It requires Org (The denote-date-prompt-use-org-read-date option).
- Function
denote-prompt-for-date-return-id - Use
denote-date-promptand return it asdenote-id-format.
- Function
denote-template-prompt - Prompt for template key in
denote-templatesand return its value.
- Function
denote-subdirectory-prompt - Prompt for subdirectory of
the variable
denote-directory. The table uses thefilecompletion category (so it works with packages such asmarginaliaandembark).
- Function
denote-rename-file-prompt - Prompt to rename file named
OLD-NAMEtoNEW-NAME.
- Function
denote-rename-file-and-buffer - Rename file named
OLD-NAMEtoNEW-NAME, updating buffer name.
- Function
denote-update-dired-buffers - Update Dired buffers of
variable
denote-directory. Note that thedenote-directoryaccepts a directory-local value for what we internally refer to as “silos” (Maintain separate directories for notes).
- Variable
denote-file-types - Alist of
denote-file-typeand their format properties.Each element is of the form
(SYMBOL PROPERTY-LIST).SYMBOLis one of those specified indenote-file-typeor an arbitrary symbol that defines a new file type.PROPERTY-LISTis a plist that consists of eight elements::extensionis a string with the file extension including the period.:date-functionis a function that can format a date. See the functionsdenote--date-iso-8601,denote--date-rfc3339, anddenote--date-org-timestamp.:front-matteris either a string passed toformator a variable holding such a string. Theformatfunction accepts four arguments, which come fromdenotein this order:TITLE,DATE,KEYWORDS,IDENTIFIER. Read the doc string offormaton how to reorder arguments.:title-key-regexpis a regular expression that is used to retrieve the title line in a file. The first line matching this regexp is considered the title line.:title-value-functionis the function used to format the raw title string for inclusion in the front matter (e.g. to surround it with quotes). Use theidentityfunction if no further processing is required.:title-value-reverse-functionis the function used to retrieve the raw title string from the front matter. It performs the reverse of:title-value-function.:keywords-key-regexpis a regular expression used to retrieve the keywords’ line in the file. The first line matching this regexp is considered the keywords’ line.:keywords-value-functionis the function used to format the keywords’ list of strings as a single string, with appropriate delimiters, for inclusion in the front matter.:keywords-value-reverse-functionis the function used to retrieve the keywords’ value from the front matter. It performs the reverse of the:keywords-value-function.:linkis a string, or variable holding a string, that specifies the format of a link. See the variablesdenote-org-link-format,denote-md-link-format.:link-in-context-regexpis a regular expression that is used to match the aforementioned link format. See the variablesdenote-org-link-in-context-regexp,denote-md-link-in-context-regexp.
If
denote-file-typeis nil, use the first element of this list for new note creation. The default isorg.
- Variable
denote-org-front-matter - Specifies the Org front
matter. It is passed to
formatwith argumentsTITLE,DATE,KEYWORDS,ID(Change the front matter format)
- Variable
denote-yaml-front-matter - Specifies the YAML (Markdown)
front matter. It is passed to
formatwith argumentsTITLE,DATE,KEYWORDS,ID(Change the front matter format)
- Variable
denote-toml-front-matter - Specifies the TOML (Markdown)
front matter. It is passed to
formatwith argumentsTITLE,DATE,KEYWORDS,ID(Change the front matter format)
- Variable
denote-text-front-matter - Specifies the plain text
front matter. It is passed to
formatwith argumentsTITLE,DATE,KEYWORDS,ID(Change the front matter format)
- Variable
denote-org-link-format - Format of Org link to note.
The value is passed to
formatwithIDENTIFIERandTITLEarguments, in this order. Also seedenote-org-link-in-context-regexp.
- Variable
denote-md-link-format - Format of Markdown link to note.
The
%N$snotation used in the default value is forformatas the supplied arguments areIDENTIFIERandTITLE, in this order. Also seedenote-md-link-in-context-regexp.
- Variable
denote-id-only-link-format - Format of identifier-only
link to note. The value is passed to
formatwithIDENTIFIERas its sole argument. Also seedenote-id-only-link-in-context-regexp.
- Variable
denote-org-link-in-context-regexp - Regexp to match an
Org link in its context. The format of such links is
denote-org-link-format.
- Variable
denote-md-link-in-context-regexp - Regexp to match an
Markdown link in its context. The format of such links is
denote-md-link-format.
- Variable
denote-id-only-link-in-context-regexp - Regexp to match
an identifier-only link in its context. The format of such links is
denote-id-only-link-format.
- Function
denote-surround-with-quotes - Surround string
Swith quotes. This can be used indenote-file-typesto format front mattter.
- Function
denote-date-org-timestamp - Format
DATEusing the Org inactive timestamp notation.
- Function
denote-date-rfc3339 - Format
DATEusing the RFC3339 specification.
- Function
denote-date-iso-8601 - Format
DATEaccording to ISO 8601 standard.
- Function
denote-trim-whitespace - Trim whitespace around string
S. This can be used indenote-file-typesto format front mattter.
- Function
denote-trim-whitespace-then-quotes - Trim whitespace
then quotes around string
S. This can be used indenote-file-typesto format front mattter.
- Function
denote-format-keywords-for-md-front-matter - Format
front matter
KEYWORDSfor markdown file type.KEYWORDSis a list of strings. Consult thedenote-file-typesfor how this is used.
- Function
denote-format-keywords-for-text-front-matter - Format
front matter
KEYWORDSfor text file type.KEYWORDSis a list of strings. Consult thedenote-file-typesfor how this is used.
- Function
denote-format-keywords-for-org-front-matter - Format
front matter
KEYWORDSfor org file type.KEYWORDSis a list of strings. Consult thedenote-file-typesfor how this is used.
- Function
denote-extract-keywords-from-front-matter - Format front
matter
KEYWORDSfor org file type.KEYWORDSis a list of strings. Consult thedenote-file-typesfor how this is used.
Denote is a GNU ELPA package. As such, any significant change to the code requires copyright assignment to the Free Software Foundation (more below).
You do not need to be a programmer to contribute to this package. Sharing an idea or describing a workflow is equally helpful, as it teaches us something we may not know and might be able to cover either by extending Denote or expanding this manual (Things to do). If you prefer to write a blog post, make sure you share it with us: we can add a section herein referencing all such articles. Everyone gets acknowledged (Acknowledgements). There is no such thing as an “insignificant contribution”—they all matter.
- Package name (GNU ELPA):
denote - Official manual: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote
- Change log: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote-changelog
- Git repo on SourceHut: https://git.sr.ht/~protesilaos/denote
- Mirrors:
- Mailing list: https://lists.sr.ht/~protesilaos/denote
If our public media are not suitable, you are welcome to contact me (Protesilaos) in private: https://protesilaos.com/contact.
Copyright assignment is a prerequisite to sharing code. It is a simple process. Check the request form below (please adapt it accordingly). You must write an email to the address mentioned in the form and then wait for the FSF to send you a legal agreement. Sign the document and file it back to them. This could all happen via email and take about a week. You are encouraged to go through this process. You only need to do it once. It will allow you to make contributions to Emacs in general.
Please email the following information to [email protected], and we will send you the assignment form for your past and future changes. Please use your full legal name (in ASCII characters) as the subject line of the message. REQUEST: SEND FORM FOR PAST AND FUTURE CHANGES [What is the name of the program or package you're contributing to?] GNU Emacs [Did you copy any files or text written by someone else in these changes? Even if that material is free software, we need to know about it.] Copied a few snippets from the same files I edited. Their author, Protesilaos Stavrou, has already assigned copyright to the Free Software Foundation. [Do you have an employer who might have a basis to claim to own your changes? Do you attend a school which might make such a claim?] [For the copyright registration, what country are you a citizen of?] [What year were you born?] [Please write your email address here.] [Please write your postal address here.] [Which files have you changed so far, and which new files have you written so far?]
Denote should work well for what is described in this manual. Though we can always do better. This is a non-exhaustive list with some low-priority ideas you may want to help with (Contributing).
- Support mutually-exclusive sets of tags. For example, a
homekeyword would precludework. Personally, I am not a fan of such arrangements as there may be a case where something applies to both ends of this prefigured binary. Though we can think about it. - Add command that expands the identifier in links to a full file name.
This would be useful for some sort of “export” operation where the
absolute file path is necessary and where the Denote linking mechanism
is not available. Though this could be handled by the exporter, by
doing something like what
denote-link-find-filedoes. - Add command that rewrites full names in links, if they are invalid. This would complement the renaming mechanism. Personally, I think old titles in links are not a problem, because they show you what was true at the time and are usually relevant to their context. Again though, it is an option worth exploring.
- Ensure integration between
denote:links and theembarkpackage. The idea is to allow Embark to understand the Denote buttons are links to files and correctly infer the absolute path. I am not sure what a user would want to do with this, but maybe there are some interesting possibilities.
You are welcome to suggest more ideas. If they do not broaden the scope of Denote, they can be added to denote.el. Otherwise we might think of extensions to the core package.
The Emacs community is putting Denote to great use. This section includes publications that show how people configure their note-taking setup. If you have a blog post, video, or configuration file about Denote, feel welcome to tell us about it (Contributing).
- David Wilson (SystemCrafters): Generating a Blog Site from Denote Entries, 2022-09-09, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5R7ad5xz5wo.
- David Wilson (SystemCrafters): Trying Out Prot’s Denote, an Org Roam Alternative?, 2022-07-15, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcRY_rsX0yY.
- Jack Baty: Keeping my Org Agenda updated based on Denote keywords, 2022-11-30, https://baty.net/2022/keeping-my-org-agenda-updated.
- Jeremy Friesen: Denote Emacs Configuration, 2022-10-02, https://takeonrules.com/2022/10/09/denote-emacs-configuration/
- Jeremy Friesen: Exploring the Denote Emacs Package, 2022-10-01, https://takeonrules.com/2022/10/01/exploring-the-denote-emacs-package/
- Jeremy Friesen: Migration Plan for Org-Roam Notes to Denote, 2022-10-02, https://takeonrules.com/2022/10/02/migration-plan-for-org-roam-notes-to-denote/
- Jeremy Friesen: Project Dispatch Menu with Org Mode Metadata, Denote, and Transient, 2022-11-19, https://takeonrules.com/2022/11/19/project-dispatch-menu-with-org-mode-metadata-denote-and-transient/
- Peter Prevos: Simulating Text Files with R to Test the Emacs Denote Package, 2022-07-28, https://lucidmanager.org/productivity/testing-denote-package/.
What follows is a list of Emacs packages for note-taking. I (Protesilaos) have not used any of them, as I was manually applying my file-naming scheme beforehand and by the time those packages were available I was already hacking on the predecessor of Denote as a means of learning Emacs Lisp (a package which I called “Unassuming Sidenotes of Little Significance”, aka “USLS” which is pronounced as “U-S-L-S” or “useless”). As such, I cannot comment at length on the differences between Denote and each of those packages, beside what I gather from their documentation.
- org-roam
- The de facto standard in the Emacs milieu—and rightly so! It has a massive community, is featureful, and should be an excellent companion to anyone who is invested in the Org ecosystem and/or knows what “Roam” is (I don’t). It has been explained to me that Org Roam uses a database to store a cache about your notes. It otherwise uses standard Org files. The cache helps refer to the same node through aliases which can provide lots of options. Personally, I follow a single-topic-per-note approach, so anything beyond that is overkill. If the database is only for a cache, then maybe that has no downside, though I am careful with any kind of specialised program as it creates a dependency. If you ask me about database software in particular, I have no idea how to use one, let alone debug it or retrieve data from it if something goes awry (I could learn, but that is beside the point).
- zk (or zk.el)
- Reading its documentation makes me think that this is Denote’s sibling—the two projects have a lot of things in common, including the preference to rely on plain files and standard tools. The core difference is that Denote has a strict file-naming scheme. Other differences in available features are, in principle, matters of style or circumstance: both packages can have them. As its initials imply, ZK enables a zettelkasten-like workflow. It does not enforce it though, letting the user adapt the method to their needs and requirements.
- zettelkasten
- This is another one of Denote’s relatives, at least
insofar as the goal of simplicity is concerned. The major difference
is that according to its documentation “the name of the file that is
created is just a unique ID”. This is not consistent with our
file-naming scheme which is all about making sense of your files by
their name alone and being able to visually parse a listing of them
without any kind of specialised tool (e.g.
ls -lorls -Con the command-line from inside thedenote-directorygive you a human-readable set of files names, whilefind * -maxdepth 0 -type fis another approach). - zetteldeft
- This is a zettelkasten note-taking system built on top
of the
deftpackage. Deft provides a search interface to a directory, in this case the one holding the user’szetteldeftnotes. Denote has no such dependency and is not opinionated about how the user prefers to search/access their notes: use Dired, Grep, theconsultpackage, or whatever else you already have set up for all things Emacs, not just your notes.
Searching through M-x list-packages for “zettel” brings up more
matches. zetteldesk is an extension to Org Roam and, as such, I
cannot possibly know what Org Roam truly misses and what the added-value
of this package is. neuron-mode builds on top of an external program
called neuron, which I have never used.
Searching for “note” gives us a few more results. notes-mode has
precious little documentation and I cannot tell what it actually does
(as I said in my presentation for LibrePlanet 2022, inadequate docs are
a bug). side-notes differs from what we try to do with Denote, as it
basically gives you the means to record your thoughts about some other
project you are working on and keep them on the side: so it and Denote
should not be mutually exclusive.
If I missed something, please let me know.
This section covers blog posts from the Emacs community on the matter of note-taking. They may reference some of the packages covered in the previous section or provide their custom code (Alternatives to Denote). The list is unsorted.
- José Antonio Ortega Ruiz (aka “jao”) explains a note-taking method that is simple like Denote but differs in other ways. An interesting approach overall: https://jao.io/blog/2022-06-19-simple-note-taking.html.
- Jethro Kuan (the main
org-roamdeveloper) explains their note-taking techniques: https://jethrokuan.github.io/org-roam-guide/. Good ideas all round, regardless of the package/code you choose to use.
[ Development note: help expand this list. ]
I (Protesilaos) answer some questions I have received or might get. It is assumed that you have read the rest of this manual: I will not go into the specifics of how Denote works.
I wrote Denote because I was using a variant of Denote’s file-naming
scheme before I was even an Emacs user (I switched to Emacs from
Tmux+Vim+CLI in the summer of 2019). I was originally inspired by
Jekyll, the static site generator, which I started using for my website
in 2016 (was on WordPress before). Jekyll’s files follow the
YYYY-MM-DD-TITLE.md pattern. I liked its efficiency relative to the
unstructured mess I had before. Eventually, I started using that scheme
outside the confines of my website’s source code. Over time I refined
it and here we are.
Note-taking is something I take very seriously, as I am a prolific
writer (just check my website, which only reveals the tip of the
iceberg). As such, I need a program that does exactly what I want and
which I know how to extend. I originally tried to use Org capture
templates to create new files with a Denote-style file-naming scheme but
never managed to achieve it. Maybe because org-capture has some
hard-coded assumptions or I simply am not competent enough to hack on
core Org facilities. Whatever the case, an alternative was in order.
The existence of PACKAGE is never a good reason for me not to conduct my own experiments for recreational, educational, or practical purposes. When the question arises of “why not contribute to PACKAGE instead?” the answer is that without me experimenting in the first place, I would lack the skills for such a task. Furthermore, contributing to another package does not guarantee I get what I want in terms of workflow.
Whether you should use Denote or not is another matter altogether: choose whatever you want.
I think Org is one of Emacs’ killer apps. I also believe it is not the right tool for every job. When I write notes, I want to focus on writing. Nothing more. I thus have no need for stuff like org-babel, scheduling to-do items, clocking time, and so on. The more “mental dependencies” you add to your workflow, the heavier the burden you carry and the less focused you are on the task at hand: there is always that temptation to tweak the markup, tinker with some syntactic construct, obsess about what ought to be irrelevant to writing as such.
In technical terms, I also am not fond of Org’s code base (I understand
why it is the way it is—just commenting on the fact). Ever tried to
read it? You will routinely find functions that are tens-to-hundreds of
lines long and have all sorts of special casing. As I am not a
programmer and only learnt to write Elisp through trial and error, I
have no confidence in my ability to make Org do what I want at that
level, hence denote instead of org-denote or something.
Perhaps the master programmer is one who can deal with complexity and keep adding to it. I am of the opposite view, as language—code included—is at its communicative best when it is clear and accessible.
Make no mistake: I use Org for the agenda and also to write technical documentation that needs to be exported to various formats, including this very manual.
My notes form part of my longer-term storage. I do not want to have to rely on a special program to be able to read them or filter them. Unix is universal, at least as far as I am concerned.
Denote streamlines some tasks and makes things easier in general, which is consistent with how Emacs provides a layer of interactivity on top of Unix. Still, Denote’s utilities can, in principle, be implemented as POSIX shell scripts (minus the Emacs-specific parts like fontification in Dired or the buttonization of links).
Portability matters. For example, in the future I might own a smartphone, so I prefer not to require Emacs, Org, or some other executable to access my files on the go.
Furthermore, I might want to share those files with someone. If I make Emacs a requirement, I am limiting my circle to a handful of relatively advanced users.
Please don’t misinterpret this: I am using Emacs full-time for my computing and maintain a growing list of packages for it. This is just me thinking long-term.
I have read that Org favours the latter method. If true, I strongly disagree with it because of the implicit dependency it introduces and the way it favours machine-friendliness over human-readability in terms of accessing information. Notes are long-term storage. I might want to access them on (i) some device with limited features, (ii) print on paper, (iii) share with another person who is not a tech wizard.
There are good arguments for few large files, but all either prioritize machine-friendliness or presuppose the use of sophisticated tools like Emacs+Org.
Good luck using less on a generic TTY to read a file with a zillion
words, headings, sub-headings, sub-sub-headings, property drawers, and
other constructs! You will not get the otherwise wonderful folding of
headings the way you do in Emacs—do not take such features for
granted.
My point is that notes should be atomic to help the user—and potentially the user’s family, friends, acquaintances—make sense of them in a wide range of scenaria. The more program-agnostic your file is, the better for you and/or everyone else you might share your writings with.
Human-readability means that we optimize for what matters to us. If (a)
you are the only one who will ever read your notes, (b) always have
access to good software like Emacs+Org, (c) do not care about printing
on paper, then Denote’s model is not for you. Maybe you need to tweak
some org-capture template to append a new entry to one mega file (I do
that for my Org agenda, by the way, as I explained before about using
the right tool for the job).
Denote does not do anything fancy and has no special requirements: it uses standard tools to accomplish ordinary tasks. If Emacs can cope with lots of files, then that is all you need to know: Denote will work.
To put this to the test, Peter Prevos is running simulations with R that generate large volumes of notes. You can read the technicalities here: https://lucidmanager.org/productivity/testing-denote-package/. Excerpt:
Using this code I generated ten thousands notes and used this to test the Denote package to see it if works at a large scale. This tests shows that Prot’s approach is perfectly capable of working with thousands of notes.
Of course, we are always prepared to make refinements to the code, where necessary, without compromising on the project’s principles.
Yes, many files will slow down the agenda due to how that works. Org
collects all files specified in the org-agenda-files, searches through
their contents for timestamped entries, and then loops through all days
to determine where each entry belongs. The more days and more files,
the longer it takes to build the agenda. Doing this with potentially
hundreds of files will have a noticeable impact on performance.
This is not a deficiency of Denote. It happens with generic Org files. The way the agenda is built is heavily favoring the use of a single file that holds all your timestamped entries (or at least a few such files). Tens or hundreds of files are inefficient for this job. Plus doing so has the side-effect of making Emacs open all those files, which you probably do not need.
If you want my opinion though, be more forceful with the separation of concerns. Decouple your knowledge base from your ephemeral to-do list: Denote (and others) can be used for the former, while you let standard Org work splendidly for the latter—that is what I do, anyway.
Org has a powerful linking facility, whether you use org-store-link or
do it via an org-capture template. If you want a certain note to be
associated with a task, just store the task in a single tasks.org (or
however you name it) and link to the relevant context.
Do not mix your knowledge base with your to-do items. If you need help figuring out the specifics of this workflow, you are welcome to ask for help in our relevant channels (Contributing).
Denote does not sort files and will not reinvent tools that handle such functionality. This is the job of the file manager or command-line executable that lists files.
I encourage you to read the manpage of the ls executable. It will
help you in general, while it applies to Emacs as well via Dired. The
gist is that you can update the ls flags that Dired uses on-the-fly:
type C-u M-x dired-sort-toggle-or-edit (C-u s by default) and append
--sort=time at the prompt. To reverse the order, add the -r flag.
The user option dired-listing-switches sets your default preference.
There is also “virtual Dired” if you need something that cannot be done with Dired (Use dired-virtual-mode for arbitrary file listings).
Denote does not insert any meta data or heading pertaining to edits in the file. I am of the view that these either do not scale well or are not descriptive enough. Suppose you use a “lastmod” heading with a timestamp: which lines where edited and what did the change amount to?
This is where an external program can be helpful. Use a Version Control
System, such as Git, to keep track of all your notes. Every time you
add a new file, record the addition. Same for post-creation edits.
Your VCS will let you review the history of those changes. For
instance, Emacs’ built-in version control framework has a command that
produces a log of changes for the current file: M-x vc-print-log,
bound to C-x v l by default. From there one can access the
corresponding diff output (use M-x describe-mode (C-h m) in an
unfamiliar buffer to learn more about it). With Git in particular,
Emacs users have the option of the all-round excellent magit package.
In short: let Denote (or equivalent) create notes and link between them, the file manager organise and provide access to files, search programs deal with searching and narrowing, and version control software handle the tracking of changes.
Denotes leverages the built-in xref library to search for the
identifier of the current file and return any links to it. For users
of Emacs version 28 or higher, there exists a user option to specify
the program that performs this search: xref-search-program. The
default is grep, which can be slow, though one may opt for ugrep,
ripgrep, or even specify something else (read the doc string of that
user option for the details).
Try either for these for better results:
(setq xref-search-program 'ripgrep)
;; OR
(setq xref-search-program 'ugrep)To use whatever executable is available on your system, use something like this:
;; Prefer ripgrep, then ugrep, and fall back to regular grep.
(setq xref-search-program
(cond
((or (executable-find "ripgrep")
(executable-find "rg"))
'ripgrep)
((executable-find "ugrep")
'ugrep)
(t
'grep)))Denote uses Emacs’ Xref to find backlinks. Xref requires xargs and
one of grep or ripgrep, depending on your configuration.
This is usually not an issue on *nix systems, but the necessary
executables are not available on Windows Emacs distributions. Please
ensure that you have both xargs and either grep or ripgrep
available within your PATH environment variable.
If you have git on Windows installed, then you may use the following
code (adjust the git’s installation path if necessary):
(setenv "PATH" (concat (getenv "PATH") ";" "C:\\Program Files\\Git\\usr\\bin"))Denote is meant to be a collective effort. Every bit of help matters.
- Author/maintainer
- Protesilaos Stavrou.
- Contributions to code or the manual
- Abin Simon, Alan Schmitt, Benjamin Kästner, Charanjit Singh, Clemens Radermacher, Colin McLear, Damien Cassou, Elias Storms, Eshel Yaron, Florian, Graham Marlow, Hilde Rhyne, Jack Baty, Jean-Philippe Gagné Guay, Jürgen Hötzel, Kaushal Modi, Kyle Meyer, Marc Fargas, Matthew Lemon, Noboru Ota (nobiot), Peter Prevos, Philip Kaludercic, Quiliro Ordóñez, Stefan Monnier, Thibaut Benjamin.
- Ideas and/or user feedback
- Abin Simon, Alan Schmitt, Alfredo Borrás, Benjamin Kästner, Colin McLear, Damien Cassou, Elias Storms, Federico Stilman, Florian, Frank Ehmsen, Guo Yong, Hanspeter Gisler, Jack Baty, Jeremy Friesen, Juanjo Presa, Johan Bolmsjö, Kaushal Modi, M. Hadi Timachi, Paul van Gelder, Peter Prevos, Shreyas Ragavan, Stefan Thesing, Summer Emacs, Sven Seebeck, Taoufik, Viktor Haag, Yi Liu, Ypot, atanasj, hpgisler, pRot0ta1p, sienic, sundar bp.
Special thanks to Peter Povinec who helped refine the file-naming scheme, which is the cornerstone of this project.
Special thanks to Jean-Philippe Gagné Guay for the numerous contributions to the code base.