Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

nhigham.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 73 posts

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#21

Post by kreyenborgi »

dotancohen wrote: post #17
canistel wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I faced this problem too. I am a Linux user personally, but use Windows at work. I am not a phone person, but do use it regularly. I sync org files to phone (using Syncthing) and use Orgzly to access these from Android. Although it is possible to install Emacs in Android as a terminal tool in Termux or even as a GUI tool, you need to connect a keyboard to do something sensible. Long story short, if your phone is your…

I moved from Orgzly to Orgro. Now updating the files on the phone is exactly like any other note-taking phone application (for better or worse). It's not as good as experience as the Emacs desktop, but no worse than anything else on the phone.

I also use orgro, it's very nice for reading the headings and minor edits. For more complicated edits (date stuff, moving around trees) I use the organice build that works with SyncThing https://github.com/200ok-ch/organice/issues/932#issuecomment...

Neither are full org mode, but good enough for reading notes and minor edits/captures on the go.

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#22

Post by geokon »

I used Orgmode for years, but I think fundamentally tieing your markup to your editor is kind of a bad sign... I'd be curious to hear counterarguments though. I think the primary reason it's tied is because you sort of can't make standalone ELisp apps (or at least nobody does). Otherwise you'd just have an `org2html` and `org2pdf` application at the command line.

Alternatives like Asciidoc are not perfect, esp for literate programming, b/c it's also kinda complex and so it also only has one backend (that's runnable from Clojure through JRuby!). I imagine a simpler multi-backend solution like Djot will be the future most likely. Bloated underspeced markups are on the way out.

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#23

Post by vim-guru »

MarkMarine wrote: post #4
canistel wrote: post #2

If there is one tool (if I can call it that) that changed my life, it is Org Mode. I was a Vim guy who in a desperate attempt to get digitally organised was forced to give Org Mode a try and got sucked into Emacs. I now live better organised, with far less anxiety and remain unfazed at the multi-tasking demands of the corporate world, all thanks to this major mode.

I’m a recent convert to emacs, the experience with clojure is just so much better. The best experience I’ve ever had programming with a tool honestly. Org mode is a bit of a mystery to me thus far, collapsible sections are great but could you expand on what is so helpful to you and how you use it?

You might also like the org-babel features of creating executable code-blocks. You can even mix languages by using the output of one block as the input to another. Welcome to the future of 2012 ;) I made one such document a while back with mostly Clojure, if you want to have a look: https://github.com/dnv-opensource/reagent-flow/

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#24

Post by nanna »

An org mode syntax I use heavily that I rarely see mentioned, including in this cheat sheet, is the obscurely named Radio Targets. Enclose any term or phrase in >>, hit C-c C-c on it, and then any previous or further instance of it in the same buffer will be automatically linked to it from then on. Incredibly useful when you're wroting notes on a long book for example and want to keep track of the instance when a term was defined. Turns an org file into its own wiki.

https://orgmode.org/manual/Radio-Targets.html

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#25

Post by nanna »

I wish org mode had a syntax for end of line comments. Why do comments have to be their own line or in a space eating comment block? Sometimes I just want to comment something I've written without the extra space and ambiguity of breaking to a new line.

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#26

Post by hitchdev »

geokon wrote: post #22

I used Orgmode for years, but I think fundamentally tieing your markup to your editor is kind of a bad sign... I'd be curious to hear counterarguments though. I think the primary reason it's tied is because you sort of can't make standalone ELisp apps (or at least nobody does). Otherwise you'd just have an `org2html` and `org2pdf` application at the command line. Alternatives like Asciidoc are not perfect, esp for li…

>you sort of can't make standalone ELisp apps (or at least nobody does). Otherwise you'd just have an `org2html` and `org2pdf` application at the command line.

Because I don't like emacs and I wanted to lean on command line apps for getting data into and out of my orgzly org-mode electronic brain, I've been doing this by combining orgmode with jinja2 (I do this with a cli app I wrote called 'orji').

I think it's a very powerful combination. I use it to generate latex/html/whatever and short bash scripts which are then run. E.g.

* Generate my CV using a latex CV template I found on overleaf that I converted into a jinja2 template.

* Send the contents of a TODO note tagged 'sendemail' as an email with a tiny templated bash script.

* Create jira ticket with the details of a note.

* Generate reveal.js presentations.

All from my phone, using orgzly and one big button which runs a single termux script that seeks out TODO notes with labels (e.g. cv/sendemail) that match the scripts in my library (cv.sh / sendemail.sh).

jinja2 certainly has the capability to end up creating a huge old mess if you abuse it, especially to generate code, but I find that using it to template tiny 5-6 line bash scripts or a latex or an HTML file hits a sweet spot of usability and flexibility.

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#27

Post by d0mine »

geokon wrote: post #22

I used Orgmode for years, but I think fundamentally tieing your markup to your editor is kind of a bad sign... I'd be curious to hear counterarguments though. I think the primary reason it's tied is because you sort of can't make standalone ELisp apps (or at least nobody does). Otherwise you'd just have an `org2html` and `org2pdf` application at the command line. Alternatives like Asciidoc are not perfect, esp for li…

Org mode is a markup language in the same way as Emacs is just an editor. Both are true but do not tell the whole story. Org is a plain text application framework built on top of Emacs platform.

My favorite is Org Babel (jupyter notebooks on steroids) that can be used for literate programming that you mentioned (reproducible research, devops-y tasks).

Publishing is just one of many applications. There are certainly cases where you might want a more specialized tool.

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#28

Post by adityaathalye »

geokon wrote: post #22

I used Orgmode for years, but I think fundamentally tieing your markup to your editor is kind of a bad sign... I'd be curious to hear counterarguments though. I think the primary reason it's tied is because you sort of can't make standalone ELisp apps (or at least nobody does). Otherwise you'd just have an `org2html` and `org2pdf` application at the command line. Alternatives like Asciidoc are not perfect, esp for li…

I daily-drive Emacs, and write my website/blog [1] in org-mode, but I use pandoc to compile org to HTML [2]... This choice was critical for me. I did not want my publishing workflow to depend on Emacs!

It's true that Emacs is the canonical Org-Mode compiler, but there are many other compilers, including Github pages. If it's typesetting you want, the support is widely available. If it is org-mode-powered workflows (like TODOs etc.), then support outside of Emacs is narrower, but still quite serviceable [3].

---

[1] built with OrgMode and pandoc: https://www.evalapply.org/

[2] pandoc as compiler FTW. https://github.com/adityaathalye/shite/blob/b4163b566f0708fd...

  __shite_templating_compile_source_to_html() {
      # If content has front matter metadata, it is presumed to be in a format
      # that the content compiler can safely process and elide or ignore.
      local file_type=${1:?"Fail. We expect file type of content like html, org, md etc."}
  
      case ${file_type} in
          html )
              cat -
              ;;
          md )
              pandoc -f markdown -t html
              ;;
          org )
              pandoc -f org -t html
              ;;
      esac
  }
[3] Not just Emacs... https://www.evalapply.org/posts/why-and-how-i-use-org-mode/i...

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#29

Post by natrys »

geokon wrote: post #22

I used Orgmode for years, but I think fundamentally tieing your markup to your editor is kind of a bad sign... I'd be curious to hear counterarguments though. I think the primary reason it's tied is because you sort of can't make standalone ELisp apps (or at least nobody does). Otherwise you'd just have an `org2html` and `org2pdf` application at the command line. Alternatives like Asciidoc are not perfect, esp for li…

Well if you don't do that, you would only have a lowest common denominator system with none of the advanced features, and the world has enough of those.

If I wanted to emulate a fraction of org-mode features I use daily in markdown, I would have to use Obsidian with a bunch of plugins, and we would end up in same boat.

I don't know the exact spec situation, but I know that comprehensive parsing libraries in modern non-elisp languages exist. An org-mode contributor has one in Julia[1], another in Dart[2] that powers a Flutter app, and there are many tree-sitter grammar based tools that are useable from neovim (e.g. [3]). The basic org2html or org2pdf CLI needs are already addressed by Pandoc.

[1] https://github.com/tecosaur/Org.jl

[2] https://github.com/amake/org_parser

[3] https://github.com/nvim-orgmode/orgmode

Re: Org Mode Syntax Cheat Sheet (2017)

#30

Post by SansGuidon »

dotancohen wrote: post #18
SansGuidon wrote: post #13

I like the idea of OBTF and org mode but I find the syntax quite inconvenient. I do not like Markdown also. I'm currently taking inspiration from bujo, obtf, org mode and markdown for making my own thing based on characters I'm ok to type both on mobile and desktop and which can make it easy to find information back in a huge file both for humans and programs.

Good luck!

Thanks I find it not so hard already good results with only little code and time (thanks to llm for the draft).
Post reply on HN