Creating a new linked note: the "footnote way"

I already asked here … but it may well be a separate topic:

Is it feasible instead of creating a footnote to create merely a new note from a highlighted word or phrase within the $Text of an already existing note – without the link-type note and note+ … which are always nicely applied once one creates a footnote [Ctrl + Opt + CMD + F].

Ideas?
Cheers!

In short no. If the links bother you unduly, you could write a stamp to remove the note/note+ links generated by the process using find(), unlinkTo() and unlinkFrom().

Or:

  • Select the word and copy the text
  • Opt+Tab toggle focus onto the view pane
  • Press Return to make a new note
  • Press Cmd+V to paste the word of interest
  • Press Return to complete editing the note title

Done!

nice @mwra. But this solution does not link the notes automatically which I’ve been actually up to in the fist place.

I’m confused - you just asked how to make a ‘footnote’ without:

So did you really mean you want to make a footnote with a different link type, which most likely is ‘untitled’?

If so, the same action codes suggested above could be used. You can’t currently alter a link’s link type but what you can do is identify a link of a given type, create a new note with the same source/destination but with the desired link type, then unlink (remove) the link with the unwanted link type.

If that doesn’t help solve the issue, could you give a more detailed description of the problem, explicitly saying whether these existing ‘footnote’ features are a problem for you:

  • The selected word/phrase is used as the title of the new footnote note.
  • The original note has an outbound text link of type ‘note’ linking to the new footnote.
  • The footnote has a basic link of type ‘note+’ linking back to the originating note.
  • The footnote note is created either as the next sibling of the original or as an ‘endnote’ inside a root level container called ‘Notes’ (which is created for you if not yet present.

It’s not clear which of the above are problematic.

Exactly, @mwra.

This is what I try to achieve.

And I understand that this is not not possible right now.

That doesn’t really answer the question. What link type do you want? It’s hard to help with insufficent info as to the desired outcome. Please answer the the questions asked in my last post. That way I can actually give practical help. :grinning:

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Of course, I will. Sorry for my inappropriate answer.

I would like to create a new note starting with highlighting a word in the text-field of a given note, then press a shortcut (like the one for footnotes) and as a result get a new note with the title of the word highlighted before (in the text field of the given source note) .

The source-note and the newly create note may be linked

  1. only on-directionally (from source to new note)
  2. and the link type maybe anything but “note” or “note+” (as in footnote)

That’s why I chose the topic-name "Creating a new linked note: the “footnote way” … but without the link-type-stuff that comes with the footnote function.

Why am I asking for one-directional linking only? Well, simply because I don’t want to go the route of opening the Link-Browser in order to go back (from the new note to the source note). One can do this by using the shortcut cmd + '.

As far as I see, the link-type note+ in footnotes clutters the Map-View and does not bring any particular function.

But, I would be happy to understand the concept better and hence use it appropriately. For now, I don’t see any function in note+ other than visual. I’d like to learn: For you, as an often preferred outliner-view-user: What does note+ in footnotes bears of additional functionality?

Thanks, @mwra for taking the time to look in this.

Thanks!

This is a bit hard as a link can only have a single link type. Your request is impractical as stated. You need to choose a single link type to apply to the link, even if that is the ‘untitled’ (i.e. no (visible) link type).

However, it seems the issue is less the links or link types but the fact you find the ‘note+’ links make the app look busy. Perhaps an easier fix is to open the Links inspector, opening the ‘Link types’ pop-up and selecting ‘note+’ and then unticking the ‘visible’ tick-box. Now, all links of type ‘note+’ still exist but are never visibly drawn onto any map in that document. This goes for existing links as well as new ones as the change in the Inspector affects all links of the selected link type.

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Pretty elegant and very helpful. That works for me – for now.

Thank you, @mwra

@mwra, could you or anyone else hint me in a direction of how to achieve just that creating a stamp … since link-visibility does not appear to be an attribute that could be toggled in a boolean way.

No it is boolean, but per link-type as opposed to per link. To set the link type visibility, use the visible’ tick box as shown here. Before getting into a tricksy workaround with stamps, can you confirm this visibility method works as described - even if it doesn’t solve your problem. I just don’t want to waste time figuring/testing an action that may not actually be needed. :grinning:

works as described @mwra and certainly does help in what I try to achieve, namely: switch off any “note+” link-type links.

Thank you

Good. Given that, do you really need an action-based solution? I ask because it’s probably not possible to do except by stamping the footnote (as opposed to an alias of the footnote).

OK, this works as a stamp if one or more footnote note(s) are selected:

unlinkTo("all","note+");

Note: it does not work if an alias of the footnote is selected (or the code is used in an agent), nor does unlinkToOriginal(). I think the latter should work and have reported this elsewhere.

Great @mwra. Thank you. I put this into my records right beside your appreciated suggestion to simply toggle visibility.