I think external links deserve special treatment.
First, it would be cool if there was a way to see all external links in the current zettel, much like the "external links" section of wikipedia.
But even cooler, we could generate some zettels that wrap around external links and find out their backlinks.
Here is a proposal of how that could work:
There could be a new z:external?url query, which would make the link appear in the footer section, next to "more backlinks".
Then, a flag like z:external?url&wrap generates an associated zettel that contains only the link (possibly embedded) + a backlink section.
Multiple occurences of the same external link point to the same zettel.
The point of doing this is that, because the zettel is entirely generated (without an user accessible markdown file), the zettel is guaranteed to be terminal, in the sense that it has no forward link. For now, I manually create these wrappers around external links, but they appear in my z-index which I'd rather avoid.
I said "generate an associated zettel" but actually it's not a zettel, since there is no user written note besides the (possibly embedded) link, this is why I don't want them to appear in the z-index. This would introduce another type of page in the site, besides just zettels (and obviously the search page and z-index).
Another possibility would be to wait until this feature https://github.com/srid/neuron/issues/190 is implemented, and then we can reuse hovercards to show backlinks of external resources
The "surrounding context" of a link or a tag is the text surrounding it. When showing backlinks, we should as well display (in some manner) this surrounding context. When showing a list o...
I'm not familiar with pandoc citations but from the issue (https://github.com/srid/neuron/issues/134) is seems to be reserved for academic content. What I'm proposing is something more generic that just link the thing. The two features are not exactly orthogonal, but I think there is no conflict between them
It would be good to be able to use pandoc-citations. In pandoc it is possible to use either a common references.yaml-file to which all Zettels could refer to. Or specify the reference in the meta-d...
Heh, I've been creating reference zettels for external URLs manually for that purpose. I was planning on doing the same for citations, with the added benefit that this would give a title to citations and a way to get the full details
There's another problem: I'd like to be able to add tags on external links (e.g. todo/watch on a YT video), which implies that the external link has to exist as an actual file in the zettelkasten and not just as a neuron-generated HTML page. I'm not sure how to solve this problem
That is starting to sound out of scope of neuron. I personally have a shortcut in my task bar that creates a new zettel containing only whatever is in the clipboard as a link.
Maybe. Though, if what makes you think that is the "neuron as a todo list" thing, then I can find other examples where tagged external links might be useful. For example, I like to have zettels about recurring people in my notes (mathematicians, writers, or even bloggers...), just to gather in one place what they've worked on. Being able to tag papers, articles, blog posts, etc... with the author name would allow me to do that, using queries.
I personally have a shortcut in my task bar that creates a new zettel containing only whatever is in the clipboard as a link.
My impression is that if you want to attach metadata to links, it might make sense to just create the zettels yourself. Now what could be quite useful would be if your editor plugin could do that for you
A neuron plugin could also easily scan your notes and create reference zettels for all the links. There's still the problem that it would take two clicks to get to the target of the link though
My impression is that if you want to attach metadata to links, it might make sense to just create the zettels yourself. Now what could be quite useful would be if your editor plugin could do that for you
Alright I agree with you, I'll try to implement that in neuron-mode. That way it kinda encourages to write quick comments and summaries
As you said the only remaining feature is the ability to hide zettels, though I'd still like to to be able to see the external links on the footer of zettels
Add an unlisted metadata property to effectivley hide the zettel from the z-index, backlinks, etc. --- title: My blog post WIP unlisted: true -- ... This is mainly to allow writing of draft zettels...
I think external links deserve special treatment.
First, it would be cool if there was a way to see all external links in the current zettel, much like the "external links" section of wikipedia.
But even cooler, we could generate some zettels that wrap around external links and find out their backlinks.
Here is a proposal of how that could work:
There could be a new
z:external?urlquery, which would make the link appear in the footer section, next to "more backlinks".Then, a flag like
z:external?url&wrapgenerates an associated zettel that contains only the link (possibly embedded) + a backlink section.Multiple occurences of the same external link point to the same zettel.
The point of doing this is that, because the zettel is entirely generated (without an user accessible markdown file), the zettel is guaranteed to be terminal, in the sense that it has no forward link. For now, I manually create these wrappers around external links, but they appear in my z-index which I'd rather avoid.
Reason for wanting this ?
For example, mentionning ideas from an article in multiple zettels. Then, I can see all zettels that refer to this article.
I said "generate an associated zettel" but actually it's not a zettel, since there is no user written note besides the (possibly embedded) link, this is why I don't want them to appear in the z-index. This would introduce another type of page in the site, besides just zettels (and obviously the search page and z-index).
Another possibility would be to wait until this feature https://github.com/srid/neuron/issues/190 is implemented, and then we can reuse hovercards to show backlinks of external resources
How does this relate to the citations feature request?
I'm not familiar with pandoc citations but from the issue (https://github.com/srid/neuron/issues/134) is seems to be reserved for academic content. What I'm proposing is something more generic that just link the thing. The two features are not exactly orthogonal, but I think there is no conflict between them
Also, citations don't provide backlinks
... unless a new query is implemented like
z:zettels?citing=DOIbut I think that's too specific for neuronHeh, I've been creating reference zettels for external URLs manually for that purpose. I was planning on doing the same for citations, with the added benefit that this would give a title to citations and a way to get the full details
It's a bit annoying however because I have to click twice to get to the actual target of a link
I like the hovercards solution, it would avoid this pitfall
There's another problem: I'd like to be able to add tags on external links (e.g.
todo/watchon a YT video), which implies that the external link has to exist as an actual file in the zettelkasten and not just as a neuron-generated HTML page. I'm not sure how to solve this problemThat is starting to sound out of scope of neuron. I personally have a shortcut in my task bar that creates a new zettel containing only whatever is in the clipboard as a link.
Maybe. Though, if what makes you think that is the "neuron as a todo list" thing, then I can find other examples where tagged external links might be useful. For example, I like to have zettels about recurring people in my notes (mathematicians, writers, or even bloggers...), just to gather in one place what they've worked on. Being able to tag papers, articles, blog posts, etc... with the author name would allow me to do that, using queries.
That's a good idea :thumbs_up:
My impression is that if you want to attach metadata to links, it might make sense to just create the zettels yourself. Now what could be quite useful would be if your editor plugin could do that for you
Then the main remaining feature would be the ability to hide some zettels from the z-index
A neuron plugin could also easily scan your notes and create reference zettels for all the links. There's still the problem that it would take two clicks to get to the target of the link though
Alright I agree with you, I'll try to implement that in neuron-mode. That way it kinda encourages to write quick comments and summaries
As you said the only remaining feature is the ability to hide zettels, though I'd still like to to be able to see the external links on the footer of zettels
"ability to hide zettels" as in like https://github.com/srid/neuron/issues/158 - but exclude only from z-index?
yeah something like that