How to turn finder comments into markdown?

DEVONthink
1

I use webclipping into DT alot. I try to convert the weblink to markdown and then save this markdown file in folders for read articles (I got two: one for links without my own summary, the other for links where I wrote a summary).

The DT webclipper offers this COMMENT field, where one could actually write a lot down and still read the to be clipped website and scroll it. So I could basically write my summary in the webclipper comment section, you know?

Now how can I most easily get this “finder comment” read out and written into the markdown document of the clipped webpage? I’d like to be able to do either one of these:

  • I want to extract the text in finder comment into the start of the markdown document of the webpage (using some easy formatting to separate it from the original text)
  • OR extract the finder comment, put it into a markdown document of its own (using a certain template) but include a markdown link to the original webclipped markdown document, maybe like this:

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯
Noted from [Title of Webclip](link to webclip in DT):

(text from finder comment)
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

How can I achieve this?

2

Since I’m a script person, I’d suggest a script to do that. There might be other ways, though. Quite often, @cgrunenberg comes up with some ingenious method that’s far simpler than scripting.

3

Yeah, well, I’m not the biggest scripter this side of Jupiter, but anyway I came up with this:

tell application id "com.devon-technologies.think3"

    set theItem to (the first item of (the selection as list))
    set the clipboard to "Entnommen aus [" & name of theItem & "](" & reference URL of theItem & "):
   " & comment of theItem
   ( paste clipboard )

end tell
4

You have to modify the plain text property of the record. Which is no fun with AppleScript, but feasible. The clipboard is not needed at all for that.

5

tell application id "DNtp" is recommended instead to ensure compatibility to future releases.

6

As smart rules can’t change contents, in this case a script is the only option :slight_smile:

7

Current version:

tell application id "DNtp"
    set theItem to (the first item of (the selection as list))
    set theText to comment of theItem

    if length of theText > 0 then
        set the clipboard to "Entnommen aus [" & name of theItem & "](" & reference URL of theItem & "):

        " & theText
    else
        display dialog "Da gab's keinen Kommentar"
    end if
    (* paste clipboard *)
end tell
8

OK, I will do that later. First I now run the script and afterwards copy from the clipboard to right where I need this text.