Jrnl: Every entry should have a unique hash or identifier

[msaharia]

I would like to edit a particular entry at a later date.

Right now, I have to narrow down using jrnl @tag -n 1, for example.

[MinchinWeb]

If you use the DayOne backend format, each entry will automatically be given an unique identifier.

[msaharia]

@MinchinWeb How can I do that? If you mean using DayOne Journal itself, then I don't use it.

[MinchinWeb]

@msaharia

Open your jrnl configuration file, and add a new entry under "journals". Your new journal should point to an empty folder. Then go to your new journal folder, and create two subfolders: "entries" and "photos".

Now to use your new journal, you'll include the journal's name in any jrnl commands. Ex. To get a listing of entries jrnl dayone -s. (Commands without a journal name will refer to your default journal.)

More details on the configuration file --> http://jrnl.sh/advanced.html#configuration-file

[stelcodes]

@msaharia If you want to continue using the standard journal format, my suggestion would be:

• If you know the day you could use jrnl -from "8 january 2018" --edit
• If you know the month you could use jrnl -from "january 2018" --edit and search through the results.
• Otherwise, you could simply open your journal file in your editor and start searching keywords you remember from the entry until you find it.

Once you find your post in the journal file, simply add on to it, save, and exit.
**Make sure to include the full path to your editor in your config (ex. /usr/bin/vim)

[msaharia]

@stelabr Thanks! I am aware of these methods, and that is my current workflow. But I think a unique identifier becomes increasingly necessary as the journal gets longer and longer.

[stelcodes]

@msaharia Hey there! Sorry to revive a closed issue, but I am also starting to get a lot more jrnl entries and I was wondering what your workflow is with editing older entries with the dayone identifier. I think I'm missing something. Thanks!

[msaharia]

@stelabr Unfortunately, I don't use day-one as well. The unique identifier is an absolute necessity of a journal such as this, in my opinion.

[stale[bot]]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.

[msaharia]

I still think having a unique identifier will be a killer feature.

[gregorybodnar]

I've found the full timestamp to be unique enough for my needs.

jrnl -on "2019-07-11 14:28" --edit

will let me edit exactly one entry.

I get the timestamp by composing with other tools:

jrnl --short | fzf | cut -d' ' -f1,2

If you have only one journal file, these are trivial to put together into a single shell function. If you have more than one journal file, then you may need some argument parsing to select which journal. In the simplest form, you'll get something like this:

jrnl -on $(jrnl --short | fzf | cut -d' ' -f1,2) --edit

I'm planning on putting a couple fzf integrations into the recipes this weekend, but that could get you started.

[wren]

@msaharia I think this could be pretty useful. Would you mind elaborating on some of the use cases that you see for this feature?

[stale[bot]]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.

[micahellison]

This seems like a great feature for a lot of reasons, such as #949. The question is how best to implement it while preserving compatibility and reliability.