Emacs org-mode
Welcome to the Emacs org-mode category.
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I am working on restoring some of my related posts from my old blog, so keep checking here for new content.
Updating my Emacs settings file. As this is now in an org file, it’s so easy to write comments there. It helps since comments on the blog get lost over time. If you’re an Emacs nutcase, let me know what you think đŦ
Sharing my CSS Tweaks and Emacs Configurations
And now it’s my to complete a milestone:
Uploading my Emacs config! That’s right. And with it, side by side, the CSS customizations I’ve made to my blog (I’ve made a couple of changes since I last talked about it).
Find them in my public folder on GitLab or just read the new welcome note there.
He did it! Prot created a function that converts denote links back to “regular” org-mode links, using some regex magic.
This means I can now upload org-mode files directly into GitLab, which displays org files natively. Take a look
I’m happy with how my org-mode notes look like in GitLab:
I need to resolve a few things, like creating another folder for these notes and tying it into my repository, but after I’m done, the hope is for much more streamlined informational notes.
Another Emacs org-mode re-discovered feature as I’m improving my workflow:
Org-agenda is org-mode’s search engine. I include user names as metadata in work-related tasks.
to search tags & properties: C-c a m. For properties though: <name of property>: "<value>"
My
Another thing I enjoy doing with Emacs org-mode is my habit of watching movies. Emacs reminds me it’s time to watch a good movie in a range of every three days to 10 days. When I watch a movie, I write the title and the year down and reset the clock - which will remind me to watch a movie again in 3 days.
On Emacs, it looks like this:
This is a habit graph. Each rectangle represents a day. The asterisk is when I watched a movie last; the exclamation point represents today. The green bar represents the time range (3 to 10 days), with the last day being in yellow, reminding me it’s the last day to complete the habit before I’m “in the red.”
So, in this case, I have today, tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow to watch a movie before I’m “in the red” for this habit. Don’t worry! It won’t happen.
When you open this habit up, you can see a list of the movies I watched and when:
Nifty.
I talked about making some changes to my project workflow in Emacs, and here are some changes I’ve implemented:
("p" "Personal Related")
("pt" "Personal Task" entry
(file "~/Sync/Personal/Projects.org") "* ACTIVE %^{What?} \n*** TODO Probes:\n %^t--%^t \n\n %U:\n %?" :kill-buffer t)
I talked about making some changes to my project workflow in Emacs, and here are some changes I’ve implemented:
The %t^ org-mode expansion tells Emacs to prompt for a date without a time. It calls a calendar in Emacs with the current day marked, which can be adjusted. In my case, you see two of those: the project’s start and the end (double dashes are how org-mode phrases a time range).
So, let’s say I have a new photography project I want to do throughout February. I call this capture template and enter the first day of February, followed by its last day. This will display the project (say, “photography project”) on my agenda every day throughout the month of February.
In the past, each project (which is an active task with sub-tasks marked by “TODO” items) had several of its subtasks scheduled at specific times. This has been my process for years, though it’s not very useful: I almost never get to work on my TODOs exactly at the time of my choosing.
The idea is that instead of having a list of 20 items that I need to do clutter my agenda with times in the day that don’t make sense, I will only have a couple of highlighted projects I know I’m working on. I can then go into each project from the agenda and see what the next action item I need to do there. This would be a TODO keyword without a scheduled timestamp.
Denote and org-mode instead of my TiddlyWiki?
While I just explained why I’m dropping some of the usages for org-mode, it’s still very powerful for what I do need it: projects and notes.
One of the thoughts that crossed my mind on a walk today was to convert my wiki into a collection of org files. This makes sense because I write my notes in org-mode anyway before I convert them into Markdown and then paste them into TiddlyWiki. At the same time, GitLab can read org files just fine, complete with images.
TiddlyWiki has a lot of functions built into it, but I might do fine without them, especially with Denote introducing dynamic blocks. Dynamic blocks are essentially meta notes, a key feature that allows one to build a wiki from their notes, as it introduces a hierarchy of links.
If I can make this work, the friction in my current workflow (write in org-mode, convert to markdown, edit, paste into TiddlyWiki, push changes to gitlab) will be minimized (write in org-mode, push changes into gitlab, edit after the fact) and will allow me to write more notes, more often. This sounds good.
Less org-mode, more Outlook? Why!?
It was one of our regular Wednesday date nights. Nat and I decided to meet in one of our favorite local spots instead of ordering in. Knowing Nat finishes work at 6:30, I calculated it would take me about 20 minutes to walk over, meeting at around 7 PM. When it was time to go, I showered, put on clothes and… realized Nat was already there. I was half an hour late instead of 10 minutes early as planned.
Nat leaves work at 6:00, not 6:30. He gets home at 6:30. My brain did one of its famous “brain farts” where it convinced me, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that Nat had /always finished work at 6:30 for the last five years or so. I was so convinced that I even argued with Nat, saying he must have left work early.
Being the awesome person he is, Nat didn’t take it too hard. After all, living with me means dealing with these issues more often than not. It’s just something that happens now and then. Me, on the other hand? I had enough.
I was never good with dates and times; call it ADHD, call it scatter-brain, call it age, call it whatever. Many people who read this would probably think I should use a calendar. You’re right, most people! I should! The only problem with this is org-mode. Let me explain.
My life is organized in Emacs org-mode. Everything I do, big and small, is written down inside Emacs. It’s my personal database, with search capabilities, dates and hours, TODO lists, and an agenda. I love org-mode, and I’ve said many times it’s the one thing that made me able to organize my life, or I would be a complete mess made of incidents like the one I described above.
Emacs is awesome and all, but there is one thing it doesn’t do. It doesn’t sync with my work calendar.
Now, Before all of you Emacs champs (the rest of you can skip ahead) jump with suggestions about the various packages available to do just that: I tried those a couple of times. They don’t work for multiple reasons, and my workplace locks down some of Microsoft 365 abilities for a good reason. So sit back down, please (I know someone is going to leave a comment anyway. Go ahead you, get it out of your system.)
On with the story.
While contemplating my choices, I realized there’s another big area where I stopped using org-mode: my journal. I started writing analog about two months ago, leaving my digital journal in Emacs behind. I’m enjoying it, and I already have my next blank notebook waiting for me when I’m done with my current one.
Another thing that has changed since I started using org-mode is my work style. COVID introduced the option of working remotely, and the change in my role enhanced that. My daily work computer is a Mac, not a Windows PC, which is less distracting and works with many Linux applications, Emacs included. I no longer have many time-sensitive, urgent, small tasks, as I often manage larger projects with a long-term commitment. However, my work routine in Emacs hasn’t changed in years.
Here’s an example of my current workflow. Whenever there’s a meeting scheduled, I’d go into Emacs and call up a capture function, which will ask me for the title of the meeting and the time it’s scheduled for. It will create a sub-header for my notes, complete with bullet points. Handy, but as I mentioned, I can’t sync between Outlook and Emacs. Every week, I need to look at my work calendar in Outlook, manually add meetings for the upcoming week, and keep them in sync. If a meeting is canceled, I need to remove it in Emacs; if a new one pops up or the time changes, I will have to adjust it. And these days, I have more meetings than ever before.
Then there’s the problem I told you about at the beginning. org-mode’s built-in agenda doesn’t help with my visually-needy brain. The agenda is a wall of text with timestamps and numbers. Since I need to manually enter times and dates, I type the information into org-mode as I remember it. The problem is right there: “as I remember it.” I must have corrected dates and times in Emacs a hundred times. So, I decided to no longer update org-mode with events and meetings.
I’m not fond of Outlook or Google Calendar, but I’ve been forced to use them for years. My partners, friends, and family all have a Google account, which means they see what’s coming up in real-time and can call me out on erroneous times my brain comes up with. The calendars are color-coded and reflect the same visual interface that - very importantly - I also see on my phone in real-time.
While I’m telling you about Outlook and calendars, let me throw something else in: Reminders. I’ve used org-mode for those, and when I’m away from the computer, I use Orgzly on my Android to sync quick notes to my agenda. Since I switched to my iPhone, syncing with Emacs stopped (There’s another technical reason why I can’t sync Emacs notes with my iPhone, which I won’t get into here). When I want to capture a quick idea, the best way is to take out the phone and dictate my thoughts or perhaps record a short voice memo. If it’s a quick thing, like remembering to take the laundry out, all I have to do is ask Siri to remind me. If it’s something more complicated, like brainstorming this post, I would rewrite it as a project, completed with sub-tasks, into org-mode using the short memo as an introduction/outline.
On my Mac, I now have a widget for my Outlook agenda, which integrates my work and personal calendars. Below is a widget for my reminders from my “Oh Snap!” list, which reflects things I want to see in front of me. This list is meant only for quick reminders, while I have a “planning” list of reminders for events further in the future.
I’m still working with org-mode for anything project-related. It keeps me focused and organized at what it does best for me: breaking down big projects into doable tasks and keeping notes organized, private, and stored for the long term. This is an adjustment, and I will probably go back and forth a couple of times, but I’m pretty sure the days of my weekly files are numbered, as I don’t have use for those anymore.
Emacs and OSM (Open Street Maps) are a natural match, so it just makes sense they work very well together out of the box.
Built-in search function, zooming in and out, and creating org-mode links with a single keystroke to locations. Amazing. If you’re an Emacs user, grab it now!
GNU ELPA - osm elpa.gnu.org
Reader: elpa.gnu.org