cli-diary

Keep a diary using the cli. This program is designed for CLI users to quickly keep a diary or notebook using the command line.

Installation

Clone this repository using git and run the following command using cargo:

cargo build --release

Then move the resulting binary ./target/release/diary to ~/.cargo/bin/. You will then be able to run the program using the diary command.

Alternatively, use cargo to install it from crates.io:

cargo install cli-diary

First Steps

Setup diary by specifying where you want the diary folder to be kept. Either cd to where you want the diary/ folder to be created or make a note of the filepath. You will then need to use the init sub-command as follows:

diary init <path/to/create>

The path is optional and if not provided the new diary/ folder will be created in the current directory. You can also pass an optional --prefix flag. The value provided to this will be used to prefix you diary file names. By default diary is used a prefix, see more below. Finally, you can also include the --repo flag to automatically init a git repo in the diary folder.

Configuration

Diary's configuration file is automatically placed in the following location after you run init for the first time:

~/.config/diary/diary.toml

Content

Below is an example config file.

# The location of the diary.
diary_path = '/home/user/diary'

# The prefix assigned to the diary entries filename,
# e.g. diary_2020-01-01.md
prefix = 'diary'

# The file types to use for diary entries.
# Currently supported: md, rst.
file_type = 'rst'

Usage

New Command

The first command you should run each day is the new command. This creates a new entry for the day (only one is currently permitted). If you provide the -o or --open flag your editor will open and you will be able to quickly make your first entry. Save and quit your editor to add the content to the entry.

diary new -o

Add Command

The add command allows you to add to today's entry on the fly. Similar to new -o the add command opens your system editor to allow you to type the contents on the new entry. To make this easier it is recommended you use a CLI text editor like nano or vim.

The add command also has an optional --tag flag which allows you to specify a level 2 heading tag to automatically place above the entry.

diary new --tag Tip

Content of the new entry.

Results in:

## Tip

Content of the new entry.

Tip
^^^

Content of the new entry.

Open Command

The open command allows you to open today's entry for review. Similar to add it will open your system editor, but it will open the entire file.

diary open

To open a different day's entry you can provide the --date tag along with the date in %Y-%m-%d format, other formats may work.

dairy open --date 2021-11-01

Commit command

The commit command allows you to commit an entry to a Git repo without having to navigate to the diary folder.

diary commit -m "An optional commit message".

To commit a different day's entry you can provide the --date tag along with the date in %Y-%m-%d format, other formats may work.

dairy commit --date 2021-11-01

There is also a --push flag to immediately push to the remote repo.

Diary Folder Structure

The diary/ folder is organised into monthly sub-folders with each days entry being a markdown file.

diary
└── 2021-11
    ├── diary_2021-11-06.md
    └── diary_2021-11-07.md

Acknowledgements

Huge thanks to the authors of the Cargo library. The architecture of this tool is heavily inspired by it.