simple-denote.nvim

Archive Note: This repo has been moved to https://codeberg.org/Historia/simple-denote.nvim, although it's simple and feature complete so I don't know that anything will change.

This Neovim plugin provides a command :Denote note that prompts for a title and keywords (tags), then creates a new file in a flat notes directory using the Emacs Denote package's file-naming scheme:

DATE==SIGNATURE--TITLE__KEYWORDS.EXTENSION

For example:

1. 20240601T174946--how-to-tie-a-tie__lifeskills_clothes.md
2. 20240601T180054--title-only.org
3. 20240601T193022__only_keywords.norg
4. 20240601T200121.txt
5. 20240601T213392==1a1--i-have-a-signature__denote.csv

That's all this does: create and consistently rename text files using the above scheme. No frontmatter, links, etc. I have overcomplicated my notes too many times with fancy Org Mode and Zettelkasten systems and this is my minimalist endgame.

The file-naming should be 1:1 with denote.el, down to minor things like triming/combining excess whitespace, removing special characters, disallowing multi-word keywords, and separating signature terms with = (e.g. ==three=word=sig).

Installation / Config

Example config via lazy.nvim

{
  "DefaultGen/simple-denote.nvim",
  opts = {
    ext = "md",             -- Note file extension (e.g. md, org, norg, txt)
    dir = "~/notes",        -- Notes directory (should already exist)
    add_heading = true,     -- Add a md/org heading to new notes
    retitle_heading = true, -- Replace the first line heading when retitling
  },
},

The heading options automatically support Markdown (#) and Org/Norg (*) headings.

Keymaps

Maybe you want to set keymaps for the commands as well

vim.keymap.set({'n','v'}, '<leader>nn', ":Denote note<cr>",      { desc = "New note"         })
vim.keymap.set({'n','v'}, '<leader>nt', ":Denote title<cr>",     { desc = "Change title"     })
vim.keymap.set({'n','v'}, '<leader>nk', ":Denote keywords<cr>",  { desc = "Change keywords"      })
vim.keymap.set({'n','v'}, '<leader>nz', ":Denote signature<cr>", { desc = "Change signature" })

Manual Install

To install without a package manager:

mkdir -p ~/.local/share/nvim/site/pack/simple-denote.nvim/start
cd ~/.local/share/nvim/site/pack/simple-denote.nvim/start
git clone https://github.com/DefaultGen/simple-denote.nvim

Add the following to ~/.config/nvim/init.lua

require('simple-denote').setup({
  ext = "md",
  dir = "~/notes",
  add_heading = true,
  retitle_heading = true,
})

Manual upgrade

cd ~/.local/share/nvim/site/pack/simple-denote.nvim/start/simple-denote.nvim
git pull

:Denote Command

" Creates a new note in the `dir` directory with `ext` extension
" Keywords are space delimited. The title or keywords can be blank.
:Denote note

" Renames the current note with the new title
" If `retitle_heading` is true, overwrites the first line heading as well
:Denote title

" Renames the current note with the new list of keywords (space delimited)
:Denote keywords

" Rename the current note with a signature
" This has a user-defined meaning and no particular purpose
:Denote signature

Credits

• HumanEntity/denote.nvim - This project was based on denote.nvim and modified to suit my personal preference or closer adhere to the original Denote spec.
• denote.el - The original Emacs package

License

MIT