Notes from Template

This plugin adds commands to create notes based on template files. It will go through each file in the templates directory in the settings, and create a command 'From Template: ' for each file. Each command will create a note based on the given template, with a popup to request values for each variable found in the template in Mustache syntax.

Discussion thread on Obsidian Forum: https://forum.obsidian.md/t/plugin-create-notes-from-templates/23452

Quickstart

An example template file might be:

---
template-output: People
tags: person, {{tags}}
template-replacement: "[[{{title}}]] ![[{{title}}#^overview]]"
template-input: title, overview, body
template-should-replace: "sometimes"
template-should-create: "open-pane"
---
# {{title}}

{{overview:area}}
^overview

Organisation: {{organisation}}

{{body}}

This would

• pop up a window requesting a note title, an overview (in a text box) an organisation (text field) and some tags.
• if the selection in the editor was "Joe Blogs - manager at Weissman Heiss - (lots of details)", the popup would be populated with Joe Blogs as the title, 'manager at Weissman Heiss' as the overview, and lots of details in the body field.
• create a note based on the template in the People directory.
• replace the selection text with the replacement string - in this case, a link to the note, and a transclusion of the overview paragraph. If there is no text selected, it won't put anything into the document.
• open the new note in a new window

Details

YAML and Properties

Templates can contain YAML fields that will be filed out in the same way as the rest of the template and become part of the note's Properties. So this will work as expected:

---
organsiation: "{{organisation}}"
---
{{name}} works at {{organisation}}

In order to be proper YAML, values cannot start with { or they are treated as dictionaries, so make sure to use organisation: "{{org}}" rather than organisation: {{org}} in the frontmatter.

For List properties, it will try to be clever if you make the property a List in the template. So you can have a template like this:

tags:
  - template-test
  - "{{tags}}"

and if you put extra-tag, another-extra-tag in the input field, it will render as:

tags:
  - template-test
  - extra-tag
  - another-extra-tag

From Template YAML Properties

(these will all be filtered out of the rendered note)

Name	Value	Default
template-id	Unique ID for the template	Lowercase version of the base name
template-name	Name for the command	Base name of the file
template-output	Directory to save the output	test
template-filename	Filename for the created note. Will have .md appended. Note: if you set a different filename, then make sure to use {{filename}} in the template-replacement strings if you want to link to the file.	{{title}}
template-replacement	A Mustache template to replace the selected text in the editor with. Can pass a list, which will appear as buttons in creator	{{[[title]]}}
template-input	If the command is called with some text selected, split it up using the plugin's split pattern, and put the values into those fields	title,body
template-should-replace	Should the template write text back to the document? "always", "sometimes" = only if text is selected, "never"	"sometimes"
template-should-create	Should the template make and open a note? "none"=no note, "create"= create but don't open, "open"=create and open in current editor, "open-pane" = create and open in new pane, "open-tab" = open in new tab	"open-tab"

Examples

• Create a new note with a complex filename, then insert the title with a transclusion of the overview:

template-filename: "{{title}} - autocreated"
template-replacement: "{{title}} - ![[{{filename#^overview}}]]"

• Template will always put the result back into the current document:

template-should-create: "none"
template-should-replace: "always"
template-replacement: "{{templateResult}}"

Field Types

Each field is double curly braces, a field ID, a field type (defaults to text), some number of arguments separated by : and optionally a description after a |, i.e. {{fieldID:fieldType:arg1:arg2|This is an example field}}

Type	Args	Description	Example(s)
text	none	A text input field - this is the default	{{name}}, {{country:text}}, {{country:text:Belgium}}
area	none	A text area - default if the field name is 'body'	{{description:area}}, {{body}}
currentDate	format	The current date, using the format in Luxon format (https://moment.github.io/luxon/#/formatting) (Moment.js shouldn't be used for new projects, dayjs doesn't play nicely with the build system)	{{now:currentDate:dd-MM-yyyy}}
choice	choices	A dropdown select field	{{suit:choice:hearts:spades:diamonds:clubs}}
multi	choices	A multi-select field	{{colors:multi:yellow:red:green:blue}}

Non-field tags

Field	Description	Usage Example
currentTitle	The title of the active note when the template was triggered	parent: [[{currentTitle}]] in frontmatter to create hierarchy
currentPath	The path of the active note when the template was triggered

Hotkeys

Some hotkeys are defined:

• Mod + enter: submit template
• Mod + (1-9): jump to field
• Ctrl + (1-9): select replacement string N

Development

Very open to collaboration - drop me a line or PR

Changelog

0.1.13

• Tidied up styling
• Added in support for escaping delimiters in fields (e.g. hh\:mm\:ss for a time value)
• Added in descriptions for fields with a | character, e.g {{field|description}} which will be shown in the template UI.
• Another refactor - codebase is cleaner, uses Obsidian markdown/YAML parsing for frontmatter, gives better handling of list properies etc.
• Added initial suggestion support: now a tags field will suggest existing tags, and other fields will suggest internal links if [[ is entered.
• Quality of life improvements:
  • Allow calling template even if not in an open editor (Note: can't replace text in e.g. Kanban fields, but in those cases copies replacement to Clipboard)
  • Better error handling
  • Better filename support
  • Added option to open file in new Tab
  • Can use {{properties}} in template-output (e.g. template-output: Projects/{{project}} to put files in project directories)
  • Will prompt for creating folders that don't exist

0.1.11

• Added CSS class to modal for styling
• Added multi field type to allow a multi-select with toggles
• Added field descriptions: {fieldname:text:default:description} or {fieldname:area:description}

0.1.7

• Added currentdate field type, e.g. {{now:currentdate:dd-MM-yyyy}}
• Added currentPath and currentTitle field names, e.g. [[{{currentTitle}}]] to link back to current note

0.1.6

• Templates now loaded dynamically - no more restarts! (also: changed template folder selection to dropdown,command for re-indexing)
• Added a choice type, e.g. {{suit:choice:hearts:spades:diamonds:clubs}}
• Note filenames are now generated from a template string, either in config, or in template-filename in the template. Defaults to {{title}}, but all template fields available.
• Added multiple replacement text possibility - If an array is given for template-replacement, then these will all be options in the template dialog
• Many UI tweaks, fixed YAML parsing

0.1.5

Big changes - completely refactored, new options, new fields, most defaults in settings, should be more responsive to template changes