Is there anything on the roadmap along the lines of creating and linking to new spaces with slash commands? I just started using Kinopio and it’s the first thing that immediately jumped out to me. I want to be able to build things hierarchically, but it’s a little slow to create a space in the top left and then link to it where I want to. Or maybe if I could convert a card to a new space and link it in-place. Does that make sense?
Also, adding my own request/comment: it feels right to have it under / because that is currently how you link to an existing space. So it feels natural that you could also create a new space with that. But I also wanted to mention that, I know we’ve discussed having some command palette or slash command interface in general, so keep that in mind before overloading the /, in case we wanted it to be more general. That would mean reworking the current behavior so that you have to type something like /space to link to a space, for example.
I know this topic is ostensibly about creating a new space using the existing / that opens the space picker, but I wanted to make sure we had the future in mind before we further cement a particular syntax. (and maybe this topic becomes more general).
It has come up a few times where @pirijan is considering a general keyboard mechanism to trigger commands (aka command palette, slash commands).
Discord uses /<command> at the beginning of a line. It doesn’t work mid-message.
I’d like to avoid > becomes sometimes I use that to denote a quote.
The current slash is in the context of card contents. A command to create a new space in this context to me would mean: 1) create a new space, 2) let me specify the name, 3) put a link to that new space into the card, and 4) maybe navigate me to the new space.
In the past we also discussed a general way to create a new space that is not related directly to the current card or space.
how important is it that creating a new space be fully keyboard drivable?
when you type /, in addition to existing spaces to autocomplete there could be a + space button that you could click to go through a new space flow. The advantage of that is you could create new spaces with space characters.
alternatively just typing / and some other name could create a space v fluidly, but you’d have to use -s instead of space
Brought up again from adamprocter on Discord
Was using multiplayer and wanted to split the group into different smaller spaces
I can see myself using this a lot. This is a pretty central feature in other thinking tools too. For reference, in Notion this is done by typing a + and then typing the name of the new page. It will link to the new page (in the hierarchy it would be inside the current page). In Obsidian this is done by typing [[square brackets]]. That would make a new page called “square brackets” and link to it.
I think / would work well! It would build on the existing feature to link spaces, with the added ability to create a new space. That would feel intuitive to me.
This feels the best to me, most natural given what is there now.
I agree. Right now, accomplishing this task is prohibitively tedious so that even if I want to, I usually give up. By task, I mean: I’m creating cards in a space, and it starts to get crowded. I want to take a group of cards and move them to a new space. The end goal would be, have a new space with that group of cards in it, and also a card in the first space that links to the new space, and a card in the new space that links back to the first space.
I get the want to create a new space in a space, but what you seem to be describing here is almost all easily doable, except the automatic creation of backlinks.
Highlight a group of cards, select “Move” or “Copy”, and “+ New Space”
From there, I’d probably hit the button that comes up to go to the new space, and create a card with a link saying “Started From: /original space”. Then with backlinks, it’ll show up in the Link menu on the original space.
Can we make it possible to use this feature entirely from the keyboard? Right now, I don’t see a way to focus the + New Space button (tab toggles the existing space list focus). One of the reasons for this feature is to make it fast to create a new space, and the / shortcut is pretty quick, but then being forced to use the mouse kinda hurts that experience
The difference is that as you type you’re directly editing the card (instead of a separate special field), the ui is required because typing from / in cards doesn’t work if the new name you want has spaces (or caps) in it
I’m thinking the workflow could look something like this:
Type “/“
Then arrow up
2a. This basically initiates the new space creation (since down would allow you to select the first existing space)
Then everything typed between arrow up and the final ENTER would be the space name.
It’d be great if it could be inline in the card, but that’s more about aesthetics than anything (and probably more work than it’s worth). The arrow up could basically be the shortcut to select the “+ new card” button and move the cursor to the text box.
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