settle

settle is a CLI tool that helps you manage your digital Zettelkasten.

First, a little bit of history. I learned about the Zettelkasten method back in the summer of 2021. I looked at a few programs for it, and I settled on Obsidian MD. But I didn't like the experience: I was an avid Vim user, and the vim compatibility mode wasn't usable in the least. I had alreay written quite a few notes, and I didn't want to change them to make the links and tags work with other programs.

So there I was, in early August, with the idea of writing a CLI program that I could easily use with Vim (or any editor, for that matter), and at the same time use Obsidian-style links and tags. In the meantime, I've read Sonke Ahrens's How to take smart notes and have been adding features to settle. Almost a year later, and I can confidently say that it's pretty good.

There are several core principles in the design:

• plain and simple: notes are stored locally and written in markdown

• manage notes, not editors: it's the same Zettelkasten everywhere you go. The editor you use doesn't matter. Integration is done through (editor) plugins (e.g. settle.vim).

• database mirrors notes: metadata is determined by what's on the file system, not by commands. The only way to add or remove links and tags is to write, then tell settle to update the note(s).

• you can use projects, but take care: instead of using tags and putting things in the main Zettelkasten, notes like those containing games' lore or chapters of a book you're writing can be put in a project.

  The root of your Zettelkasten is a project, your inbox is a project, etc. However, the separation is only formal, since links can reference notes in any project. It's really easy to misuse them, unfortunately: they're meant to be discarded after the project is done, or incorporated into the main Zettelkasten. Either way, they're not supposed to be permanent.

• add, change, but never remove: notes may be created, but never destroyed by the program. At most, they can be renamed or moved from project to project.

• made by humans, for humans: no YAML metadata; links and tags are embedded within text, allowing you to give context to connections between ideas

Getting started

Requirements

• cargo/rust toolchain
• SQLite

Installation

There's a crate on crates.io, so you can simply run:

cargo install settle

Usage

For the commands, options, configuration, and setting up autocompletion, read the manual

If you prefer, there's also a groff document inside the doc/ dirctory which can be read with man. On the command line, of course.

The note-taking system

settle just stores and manages a database of Zettel metadata. That's it.

There are two important things to remember when writing:

• wiki-style links are used to denote the actual links between Zettel. For example, a link such as [[Neurons]] would be considered as linking to a note called precisely 'Neurons'. These can appear anywhere in the note.
• every word with a hashtag prefix is treated as a tag. For example, #psychology. Subtags (hierarchical tags), such as #biology/anatomy/humans are supported, if you want to stay more organised. You can also put these everywhere.

Besides, how do you actually start writing, if there are no explicit commands to invoke an editor? It'd have been hard trying to write code so that it works smoothly with vim or emacs and their many quirks. Instead, editor-side code is written to act as a settle plugin.

I wrote settle.vim since I'm a (neo)vim user myself. If you write a wrapper around settle, contact me at xylous.e@gmail.com and I'll make a list or something.

Roadmap

• generate database from existing files
• create Zettel
• list Zettel
• tags
  • recognize hashtag-tags (e.g. #interesting-tag)
  • search for tags
  • list all tags
• configuration
  • custom Zettelkasten directory
  • custom database file path
  • be able to use templates
• list mentioned but non-existent Zettel
• search for text inside notes
• support matching titles with wildcards
• update Zettel metadata individually
• print links
  • forward links (from a Zettel to other Zettel)
  • backlinks (to a Zettel from other Zettel)
• projects (subdirectories within the main Zettelkasten folder)
  • add notes to projects
  • create an inbox project by default
  • generate the database with projects included
  • start with an 'inbox' project by default
  • move notes from project to project
• rename notes
  • update all links to the renamed note

Meta

• configure Cargo.toml properties
• shell autocompletion
  • zsh
  • bash
  • fish
• write a proper man page
• logo (pixel art?)
• publish to crates.io
• describe the design choices of settle-rs

Contributing

Pull requests are welcome. For major changes, please open an issue first to discuss what you would like to change.

Please make sure to update tests as appropriate.

License

MIT