TextExpander Snippet Nomenclature
I currently have 217 snippets in TextExpander. That's likely not a big number for some people, but for my forgetful mind it's a lot. To keep them straight, I use a simple nomenclature for my snippet abbreviations.
The general premise is to use a short group indicator followed by a more specific identifier. It's kind of like tagging. I still use groups in TextExpander to keep them clean, but this helps me remember them.
Links
There are some URLs that I type a lot. I use the links to Working with OmniFocus, OFScripts, this website, and my email accounts (Gmail) daily, so I added them to TextExpander. I use the group indicator link and an identifier like wwo to help me remember them. So I would type link.wwo to get https://tools.joebuhlig.com/working-with-omnifocus/.
link.home = http://joebuhlig.com
link.tools = https://tools.joebuhlig.com
link.pod = http://joebuhlig.com/whaddyaknowjoe/
link.wwo = https://tools.joebuhlig.com/working-with-omnifocus/
link.ofscripts = https://github.com/joebuhlig/OFScripts
Markdown
All of my writing is done in markdown because I can get it into HTML so easily. It's only natural that I have a few snippets to make this even easier. To help me remember them, I use the group indicator md.
This one uses two snippets that I'll mention later
md.curtab = %snippet:xcurtitle%
md.image =
md.reddit = Discuss this on Reddit.
YAML
A couple months ago I moved from WordPress to a static site with Jekyll. Part of the Jekyll environment involves "Front Matter" which is comprised of YAML. Every time I create a new article or podcast, I add this to the top of the markdown file. In my scenario, I also need to create the slug for the article. I've create the following snippets with the group indicator yaml.
For the slug, you first need to copy the text to be slugified.
I usually just copy the title of the article.
yaml.slug = Javascript Snippet
var text = TextExpander.pasteboardText;
text = text.replace(/[^\w\s]/gi, '');
var newtext = text.split(" ").join("-");
TextExpander.appendOutput("/" + newtext.toLowerCase() + "/");
yaml.blog =
title: "Put Distractions in Their Place"
date: 2014-06-08
categories:
- email
- communication
permalink: /put-distractions-place/
image: /assets/posts/Put-Distractions-In-Their-Place.jpg
yaml.pod =
title: "8: Waiting to Upgrade"
date: 2014-06-08
categories: podcast
categories:
- apple
- hardware
permalink: /8/
image: /assets/posts/Waiting-to-Upgrade.jpg
podcast_link: http://traffic.libsyn.com/whaddyaknowjoe/WKJ008.mp3
podcast_file_size: 18.8 MB
podcast_duration: "20:21"
podcast_length: 19715453
Code
I write a lot of code. I build my own websites and do freelance development. I use a number of languages, so I've created group indicators for each language: html for HTML, css for CSS, rb for Ruby, py for Python, and so on. And because HTML can get to be big, I broke it into groupings for individual tags as well.
a.n = %|
p.n =
%|
p.class =
%|
div.n =
html.base =
%|html.clear =
html.img =
IP Addresses
Along with coding, I have a number of IP addresses to keep track of. I don't like referencing a table somewhere or even looking them up in 1Password. I prefer to create shortcuts to them with ip as the indicator.
ip.jb = XX.XX.XX.XX
ip.tools = XX.XX.XX.XX
ip.clientname = XX.XX.XX.XX
You didn't think I'd actually share them, did you?
Catchall/Scripts
There are a lot of cases when I just want something short and it doesn't have to be grouped because I use them so much. Formatted dates are great and so are a few scripts I run frequently. I simply use x at the start of the snippet.
Today's date in the format of YYYYMMDD
xtd = 20151211
Next Monday's date in the format of YYYYMMDD. I have one for each day of the week.
xnm = 20151214
The title of the current page in Safari
xcurtitle = Applescript
tell application "Safari"
set theName to name of front document
return theName
end tell
The URL of the current page in Safari. It removes any querystrings as well.
xcurlink = Applescript
tell application "Safari"
set theName to name of front document
set theURL to URL of front document
set oldDelimiters to AppleScript's text item delimiters
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "?"
set theArray to every text item of theURL
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to oldDelimiters
set theURL to item 1 of theArray
return theURL
end tell
xplan = Plan project for
xwait = Waiting for
xas = AppleScript
xgh = GitHub
xof = OmniFocus
