Move selected text to a different note, then embed the text back

Published with Share Note 🔸 Part of Obsidian guides

This script will take the text that is selected in the current source note, move it to a chosen destination note, and then embed the new location back into the current note.

It asks for a heading to insert into the destination note, to make the embedding work with source text of any length. If you only have a single paragraph of source text then you can use a block reference instead by pressing Escape or Cancel on the heading prompt.

Setup requirements

1. You will need the Templater plugin (install link)
2. Create a folder in your vault to store your templates.
3. Add that folder in the Templater settings, in the “Template folder location”.
4. Copy the full text from the template below, and put it into a new template file inside that folder.

The template

(remove the space in < %* at the start)

< %*
// Get the selected text
let text = app.workspace.activeEditor.getSelection()
 
// Get the desired file - credits to https://forum.obsidian.md/t/67901/4
const files = app.vault.getMarkdownFiles().map(file => {
  const fileCache = app.metadataCache.getFileCache(file)
  file.display = file.basename
  if (fileCache?.frontmatter?.aliases) {
    if (Array.isArray(fileCache.frontmatter.aliases)) {
      file.display = `${file.basename}\n${fileCache.frontmatter.aliases.join(", ")}`
    } else if (typeof fileCache.frontmatter.aliases === 'string') {
      file.display = `${file.basename}\n${fileCache.frontmatter.aliases}`
    }
  }
  return file
})
const destination = (await tp.system.suggester(files.map(x => x.display), files, false, 'Start typing any note name...', 10)).path
 
// Get the heading
let embed
const heading = await tp.system.prompt('Enter the new heading or escape/cancel to use a block reference')
if (heading) {
  text = `\n\n## ${heading.trim()}\n\n${text.trim()}\n\n`
  embed = `![[${destination.slice(0, -3)}#heading|${heading}]]\n`
} else {
  // Block reference
  const ref = Math.random().toString(36).slice(2, 7)
  text = `\n\n${text.trim()} ^${ref}\n\n`
  embed = `![[${destination.slice(0, -3)}#^ref|^${ref}]]\n`
}
 
// Add the text to the destination note
await app.vault.adapter.append(destination, text)
 
// Replace the selection with an embedded link to the new location
app.workspace.activeEditor.editor.replaceSelection(embed)
-%>

---

Asked in these threads:

• Templater: open file in new tab and append to end of file (Oct 17, 2023)
• Extract selection to heading (Sep 22, 2023)
• Using QuickAdd to extract selected text into a new note and then embedding it in original note (Jul 29, 2023)