How to use org-capture from system tray

It is almost two years since I have discovered an amazing org-mode. I am using it in more situations everyday, so recently, I wrote a simple tray application to use org-protocol with defined org-capture templates directly from desktop.

Emacs configuration

Minimal Emacs configuration requires setting up org-mode, org-protocol, emacs server mode and org-capture-templates.

(add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/org-8.3.2/lisp/")
(add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/org-8.3.2/contrib/lisp/" t)

(require 'org)
(require 'org-protocol)

(setq org-capture-templates
  '(   
    ("b" "Capture link over org-protocol" 
         entry (file+headline "/home/milosz/Documents/bookmarks.org" "Bookmark inbox")
        "** %:description\n   [[%:link][%:link]] \n   CREATED: %U\n\n   %i"  
         :immediate-finish 1 :empty-lines 1) 
    ("t" "Capture todo over org-protocol"
         entry (file+headline "/home/milosz/Documents/agenda.org" "Future tasks")
         "** TODO %:link \n   CREATED: %U\n   SOURCE: %:description\n\n   %:initial"
         :immediate-finish 1 :empty-lines 1 :prepend t)
    ("i" "Capture an idea over org-protocol"
         entry (file+headline "/home/milosz/Documents/blog.org" "Ideas")
	 "** TODO %:link \n   CREATED: %U\n   SOURCE: %:description\n\n   %:initial"
         :immediate-finish 1 :empty-lines 1 :prepend t)
   )
)

(global-set-key "\C-cc" 'org-capture)

(server-start)

Inspect template expansion and org-protocol.el source code (especially org-protocol-do-capture function) for more information.

Shell scripts

These shell scripts are designed to verify that emacs daemon process is running and then intercept call from emacsclient to trigger custom capture action.

Todo entry

Store the following shell script as ~/.emacs.d/org-add-todo.sh file.

#!/bin/sh
# Use org-protocol to add new todo entry
# params: title source description

(lsof -c emacs 2>/dev/null| grep -q server) || (emacs --daemon 2>/dev/null)

if [ "$#" -eq 3 ]; then
  emacsclient "org-protocol://capture://t/$1/$2/$3"
fi

You can use it to add new todo entry using only text terminal.

$ sh org-add-todo.sh "Create code repository" "shell" "Create and publish code repository"

Content will be stored in the /home/milosz/Documents/agenda.org file.

* Future tasks

** TODO Create code repository 
   CREATED: [2016-04-21 czw 21:19]
   SOURCE: shell

   Create and publish code repository

Idea entry

Store the following shell script as ~/.emacs.d/org-add-idea.sh file.

#!/bin/sh
# Use org-protocol to add new idea entry
# params: title source description

(lsof -c emacs 2>/dev/null | grep -q server) || (emacs --daemon 2>/dev/null)

if [ "$#" -eq 3 ]; then
  emacsclient "org-protocol://capture://i/$1/$2/$3"
fi

You can use it to add new idea entry using only text terminal.

$ sh org-add-idea.sh "Create org-mode blog post" "shell" "Create org-mode + org-protocol blog post"

Content will be stored in the /home/milosz/Documents/blog.org file.

* Ideas

** TODO Create org-mode blog post 
   CREATED: [2016-04-21 czw 22:00]
   SOURCE: shell

   Create org-mode + org-protocol blog post

Bookmark entry

Store the following shell script as ~/.emacs.d/org-add-bookmark.sh file.

#!/bin/sh
# Use org-protocol to add new bookmark entry
# param: url title description

(lsof -c emacs 2>/dev/null | grep -q server) || (emacs --daemon 2>/dev/null)

if [ "$#" -eq 3 ]; then
  emacsclient "org-protocol://capture://b/$(echo $1 | sed 's|/|%2F|g')/$2/$3"
fi

You can use it to add new bookmark entry using only text terminal.

$ sh org-add-bookmark.sh "https://sleeplessbeastie.eu/" "Personal domain" "Personal web space"

Content will be stored in the /home/milosz/Documents/bookmarks.org file.

* Bookmark inbox

** Personal domain
   [[https://sleeplessbeastie.eu/][https://sleeplessbeastie.eu/]] 
   CREATED: [2016-04-21 czw 22:11]

   Personal web space

Use sed 's|/|%2F|g' to replace / character and sed 's|\n|%0A|' to replace new line character.

System tray application

The application is available (source code) inside QT org-mode tray repository.

I have tested everything using Qt 5.6 and Ubuntu OS.

Remember to use Emacs client which works in conjunction with the built-in Emacs server.

sleeplessbeastie's notes