na
A command line tool for adding and listing per-project todos.
If you're one of the rare people like me who find this useful, feel free to buy me some coffee.
The current version of na
is 1.0.1.
na
("next action") is a command line tool designed to make it easy to see what your next actions are for any project, right from the command line. It works with TaskPaper-formatted files (but any plain text format will do), looking for @na
tags (or whatever you specify) in todo files in your current folder.
Used with Taskpaper files, it can add new todo items quickly from the command line, automatically tagging them as next actions.
It can also auto-display next actions when you enter a project directory, automatically locating any todo files and listing their next actions when you cd
to the project (optionally recursive). See the Prompt Hooks section for details.
Features
You can list next actions in files in the current directory by typing na
. By default, na
looks for *.taskpaper
files and extracts items tagged @na
and not @done
. All of these can be changed in the configuration.
Easy matching
na
features intelligent project matching. Every time it locates a todo file, it adds the project to the database. Once a project is recorded, you can list its actions by using any portion of the parent directories or file names. If your project is in ~/Sites/dev/markedapp
, you could quickly list its next actions by typing na dev mark
. It will always look for the shortest match.
Recursion
na
can also recurse subdirectories to find all todo files in child folders as well. Use the -d X
to search X levels deep from the current directory. na -r
with no arguments will recurse from your current location, looking for todo files 3 directories deep.
Adding todos
You can also quickly add todo items from the command line with the add
subcommand. The script will look for a file in the current directory with a .taskpaper
extension (configurable).
If found, it will try to locate an Inbox:
project, or create one if it doesn't exist. Any arguments after add
will be combined to create a new task in TaskPaper format. They will automatically be assigned as next actions (tagged @na
) and will show up when na
lists the tasks for the project.
Installation
Assuming you have Ruby and RubyGems installed, you can just run gem install na
. If you run into errors, use sudo gem install na
.
If you don't have Ruby/RubyGems, you can install them pretty easily with Homebrew, rvm, or asdf. I can't swear this tool is worth the time, but there are a lot of great gems available...
Usage
NAME
na - Add and list next actions for the current project
SYNOPSIS
na [global options] command [command options] [arguments...]
VERSION
1.0.2
GLOBAL OPTIONS
-a, --[no-]add - Add a next action (deprecated, for backwards compatibility)
-d, --depth=DEPTH - Recurse to depth (default: 1)
--ext=FILE_EXTENSION - File extension to consider a todo file (default: taskpaper)
--help - Show this message
-n, --[no-]note - Prompt for additional notes (deprecated, for backwards compatibility)
--na_tag=TAG - Tag to consider a next action (default: na)
-p, --priority=PRIORITY - Set a priority 0-5 (deprecated, for backwards compatibility) (default: none)
-r, --[no-]recurse - Recurse 3 directories deep (deprecated, for backwards compatability)
--version - Display the program version
COMMANDS
add - Add a new next action
find - Find actions matching a search pattern
help - Shows a list of commands or help for one command
initconfig - Initialize the config file using current global options
next, show - Show next actions
tagged - Find actions matching a tag
Commands
add
Example: na add This feature @idea I have
NAME
add - Add a new next action
SYNOPSIS
na [global options] add [command options] TASK
DESCRIPTION
Provides an easy way to store todos while you work. Add quick reminders and (if you set up Prompt Hooks) they'll automatically display next time you enter the directory. If multiple todo files are found in the current directory, a menu will allow you to pick to which file the action gets added.
COMMAND OPTIONS
-f, --file=PATH - Specify the file to which the task should be added (default: none)
-n, --[no-]note - Prompt for additional notes
-p, --priority=arg - Add a priority level 1-5 (default: 0)
-t, --tag=TAG - Use a tag other than the default next action tag (default: none)
EXAMPLES
# Add a new action to the Inbox, including a tag
na add "A cool feature I thought of @idea"
# Add a new action to the Inbox, set its @priority to 4, and prompt for an additional note
na add "A bug I need to fix" -p 4 -n
find
Example: na find cool feature idea
NAME
find - Find actions matching a search pattern
SYNOPSIS
na [global options] find [command options] PATTERN
DESCRIPTION
Search tokens are separated by spaces. Actions matching any token in the pattern will be shown (partial matches allowed). Add a + before a token to make it required, e.g. `na find +feature +maybe`
COMMAND OPTIONS
-d, --depth=DEPTH - Recurse to depth (default: 1)
-x, --[no-]exact - Match pattern exactly
EXAMPLES
# Find all actions containing feature, idea, and swift
na find feature +idea +swift
# Find all actions containing the exact text "feature idea"
na find -x feature idea
# Find all actions 3 directories deep containing either swift or obj-c
na find -d 3 swift obj-c
next, show
Examples:
na show
(list all next actions in the current directory)na show -d 3
(list all next actions in the current directory and look for additional files 3 levels deep from there)na show marked2
(show next actions from another directory you've previously used na on)
NAME
next - Show next actions
SYNOPSIS
na [global options] next [command options] OPTIONAL_QUERY
COMMAND OPTIONS
-d, --depth=DEPTH - Recurse to depth (default: none)
-t, --tag=arg - Alternate tag to search for (default: na)
EXAMPLES
# display the next actions from any todo files in the current directory
doing next
# display the next actions from the current directory and its children, 3 levels deep
doing next -d 3
tagged
Example: na tagged feature +maybe
NAME
tagged - Find actions matching a tag
SYNOPSIS
na [global options] tagged [command options] TAG [VALUE]
DESCRIPTION
Finds actions with tags matching the arguments. An action is shown if it contains any of the tags listed. Add a + before a tag to make it required, e.g. `na tagged feature +maybe`
COMMAND OPTIONS
-d, --depth=DEPTH - Recurse to depth (default: 1)
EXAMPLES
# Show all actions tagged @maybe
na tagged +maybe
# Show all actions tagged either @feature or @idea, recurse 3 levels
na tagged -d 3 feature idea
Configuration
Global options such as todo extension and default next action tag can be stored permanently by using the na initconfig
command. Run na with the global options you'd like to set, and add initconfig
at the end of the command. A file will be written to ~/.na.rc
. You can edit this manually, or just update it using the initconfig --force
command to overwrite it with new settings.
Example: na --ext md --na_tag next initconfig --force
When this command is run, it doesn't include options for subcommands, but inserts placeholders for them. If you want to permanently set an option for a subcommand, you'll need to edit ~/.na.rc
. For example, if you wanted the next
command to always recurse 2 levels deep, you could edit it to look like this:
---
:ext: taskpaper
:na_tag: na
:d: 1
commands:
:next:
:depth: 2
:add: {}
:find: {}
:tagged: {}
Note that I created a new YAML dictionary inside of the :next:
command, and added a :depth:
key that matches the setting I want to make permanent.
WARNING Don't touch most of the settings at the top of the auto-generated file. Setting any of them to true will alter the way na interprets the commands you're running. Most of those options are there for backwards compatibility with the bash version of this tool and will eventually be removed.
Prompt Hooks
You can add a prompt command to your shell to have na automatically list your next actions when you cd
into a directory. Add the appropriate command to your login file for your shell:
(You can add -r
to any of these calls to na to automatically recurse 3 directories deep)
Bash (in ~/.bash_profile):
last_command_was_cd() {
[[ $(history 1|sed -e "s/^[ ]*[0-9]*[ ]*//") =~ ^((cd|z|j|jump|g|f|pushd|popd|exit)([ ]|$)) ]] && na
}
if [[ -z "$PROMPT_COMMAND" ]]; then
PROMPT_COMMAND="eval 'last_command_was_cd'"
else
echo $PROMPT_COMMAND | grep -v -q "last_command_was_cd" && PROMPT_COMMAND="$PROMPT_COMMAND;"'eval "last_command_was_cd"'
fi
Fish (in ~/.config/fish/conf.d/*.fish):
function __should_na --on-variable PWD
# function __should_na --on-event fish_prompt
test -s (basename $PWD)".taskpaper" && na
end
Zsh (in ~/.zshrc):
chpwd() { na }
Misc
If you have gum installed, na will use it for command line input when adding tasks and notes.
PayPal link: paypal.me/ttscoff