Simpler workflow for creating notes on the fly

[chuck]

Sometimes while notetaking, I’d like to quickly create a new note (e.g. to refer to a person whose name I heard for the first time) to return to later. Currently:

1. cmd + d to open a wiki link in the original note
2. Type the name of the new note
3. Manually close the backlink by typing ]]
4. Reach for the mouse
5. Click on the new link, which creates the new note
6. Navigate back to the original note
7. Find your place in that note.
8. At a later time, return to the new note via Untagged to populate it.

This is a lot, and steps 4-7 really take you out of the note-taking flow, with all the associated context-switching costs. I’d love it if you were able to directly create a new note from a wiki link without navigating to it.

Other similar apps have smoother ways to do this. Reflect, for example, has a “Create note” option directly from the wiki link autocompletion popup (it will also create that new note if you you manually close the link with ]]).

[coquinedesign]

I’d second that… I just tested this in Upnote and when I do the [[ and type a note title that didn’t exist before, I get a prompt to create a new note. All I need to do (on ipad) is to tap on the prompt. This way I always know what I’m doing and I don’t end up with a link that leads nowhere (unless I click it one day)

[pps]

I do not want it to seem like I am invalidating your feature request, as this process is certainly more difficult than it should be. However, you can eliminate steps 4 and 5 with the shortcut to “Open link” (shift+cmd+k) - your cursor can be outside the link, to the right of “]]”. After creating the new note, press “cmd+[” to return to the original note. Then, press “enter” to go directly to the last edited place in that note.

[coquinedesign]

Better but still breaking the work flow I’d say. But thanks, I am not yet familiar with all the keyboard commands (and some I guess don’t work on the iPad)

[Torb]

An alternative here could also be that the note-link always balances it’s brackets. That way you could dismiss the keyboard and click it right after.

Currently I write the end brackets by hand and then click the link, but it’s tedious since end brackets are many levels down on the iOS keyboard.

[meowzz]

Exactly!! the current flow to create a new page while writing is too distracting.

I posted similar feedback here

Should we consider auto create non-exist wiki links as empty page?

Since Bear 2.0 now has backlink support, should we consider automatically creating a page if we link to a non-exist page? For example, [[some non exist page]] should automatically create a new page with “some non exist page” as the title, so later we can go there and complete the page. If this is not preferred by the team, can we consider adding a toggle to let the user choose whether to do this automatically? Or at least, allow auto-completion for such links? Currently, if we don’t create t…

thanks @coquinedesign for brining me here!

[jordanborth]

I feel the same way and was going to use Reflect as an example. I feel like the intention of creating a back/wiki link is to have a note to reference, otherwise, what am I creating it for in the first place?

Perhaps a Create note action in the autocomplete UI like Reflect (I would be fine if the note was automatically created, also like Reflect )

iA Writer makes this all very seamless: it will automatically insert both sets of brackets and place your cursor inside, you can use Return to escape the brackets and create the Wikilink, or Tab if you want to keep the cursor inside the brackets.