property matching in org-agenda-custom-commands

property matching in org-agenda-custom-commands

[Matt Price]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 678 bytes --]

Embarassed that I still don't really know how to use the agenda commands
after all this time :-(


I have a bunch of trees that look in part like this:
* Asisgnment 1
** Student A
:PROPERTIES:
:GRADE: 0
:END:
I would like to store a search in org-agenda-custom-commands. I generated
it initially with ~C-c a < m +GRADE="0"~. Now I have tried to store it in
org-agenda-custom-commands with this line:

("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags-tree "+GRADE=\"0\"")

However, this seems to choke, and the agenda is not generated. There are no
error messages in *Messages* so I'm not quite sure what's going on.  Can
anyone see obvious mistakes in my syntax?

Thank you!

[-- Attachment #2: Type: text/html, Size: 1000 bytes --]

Re: property matching in org-agenda-custom-commands

[Nick Dokos]

Matt Price <moptop99@gmail.com> writes:

> Embarassed that I still don't really know how to use the agenda commands after all this time :-(

Ditto - I need to read the doc for org-agenda-custom-commands every
time I try to use it.

>
> I have a bunch of trees that look in part like this:
> * Asisgnment 1
> ** Student A
> :PROPERTIES:
> :GRADE: 0
> :END:
> I would like to store a search in org-agenda-custom-commands. I generated it initially with ~C-c a < m
> +GRADE="0"~. Now I have tried to store it in org-agenda-custom-commands with this line:
>
> ("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags-tree "+GRADE=\"0\"")
>
> However, this seems to choke, and the agenda is not generated. There are no error messages in *Messages*
> so I'm not quite sure what's going on.  Can anyone see obvious mistakes in my syntax?
>
> Thank you!
>

This looks right and it also seems to work correctly for me.

One thing to note is the doc for tags-tree:

,----
|           tags-tree   Sparse tree with all tags matches in *current* file.
`----

so you need to be visiting the file.

Here's what I did:

I added it to the end of org-agenda-custom-commands with

(add-to-list 'org-agenda-custom-commands
             '("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags-tree "+GRADE=\"0\"")
             t)

then added a bunch of entries to an org file:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
* Asisgnment 1
** Student A
:PROPERTIES:
:GRADE: 0
:END:
** Student B
:PROPERTIES:
:GRADE: 1
:END:
** Student C
:PROPERTIES:
:GRADE: 0
:END:
** Student D
:PROPERTIES:
:GRADE: 2
:END:
** Student E
:PROPERTIES:
:GRADE: 0
:END:
** Student F
:PROPERTIES:
:GRADE: 3
:END:
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

Then while visiting this file, I did

C-c a F

I get a sparse tree with the headings for students A, C and E.

-- 
Nick

"There are only two hard problems in computer science: cache
invalidation, naming things, and off-by-one errors." -Martin Fowler

Re: property matching in org-agenda-custom-commands

[Thomas Plass]

Matt,

Matt Price wrote at 13:31 on April 5, 2019:
: 
: ("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags-tree "+GRADE=\"0\"")
: 
: However, this seems to choke, and the agenda is not generated.

Works as advertised (docstring'ed?), I think.  The 'tags-tree creates
a sparse tree, not an agenda.  Plain 'tags does.  If that's what
you're after.

("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags "+GRADE=\"0\"")

Thomas

Re: property matching in org-agenda-custom-commands

[Matt Price]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1057 bytes --]

Ah, I was being pretty stupid.  Thanks to both Thomas and Nick.

Is it possible to specify "current buffer only" in the definition of a
shortcut, but still produce an agenda, rather than a sparse tree? I find
the agenda in some ways easier to navigate than the sparse tree.

Also (side note) I'm having trouble using the boolean "|" in the pattern
for the property value.  I thought something like one of these would work,
but I'm having some trouble with it:

+GRADE={"0"|"Fail"}
or maybe
+GRADE={0|Fail}

etc.

Thansk as always,
Matt

On Fri, Apr 5, 2019 at 4:17 PM Thomas Plass <thunk2@arcor.de> wrote:

> Matt,
>
> Matt Price wrote at 13:31 on April 5, 2019:
> :
> : ("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags-tree "+GRADE=\"0\"")
> :
> : However, this seems to choke, and the agenda is not generated.
>
> Works as advertised (docstring'ed?), I think.  The 'tags-tree creates
> a sparse tree, not an agenda.  Plain 'tags does.  If that's what
> you're after.
>
> ("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags "+GRADE=\"0\"")
>
> Thomas
>

[-- Attachment #2: Type: text/html, Size: 1759 bytes --]

Re: property matching in org-agenda-custom-commands

[Thomas Plass]

Matt,

Matt Price wrote at 21:26 on April 5, 2019:
: Is it possible to specify "current buffer only" in the definition of a shortcut, but still
: produce an agenda, rather than a sparse tree? 

Agenda matching will always use 'org-agend-files, sparse tree matching
doesn't.  So, you'd need to force "current buffer" (really: current
file) by fiddling und unfiddling 'org-agend-files.  Kludgy.

: +GRADE={"0"|"Fail"}

The thing is that the tags matcher, used here to match PROPERTYs,
translates the "=" in the string above to Lisp `string='.  You're on
the right track to use "{|}" but then it the contents of the {}
has to be a properly escaped regexp.

This works for me:

("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags "+GRADE={0\\|Fail}")

Overkill:

("F" "Failing Students in Current Buffer Only" tags "+GRADE={^\\(0\\|Fail\\)$}")

Thomas