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Tana Paste

Generate rich Tana objects through a simple plain text language based on markdown.

Overview

Tana Paste is a way of generating rich Tana structures like fields, tags, dates, checkboxes etc, through a simple plain text paste.

It is not designed for inputting large amounts of information, and rather for automating one-off, small, generative results. For heavy lifts, use import tools, API or other scalable solutions.

The syntax is loosely modelled on Markdown.

Documentation

A Tana Paste is a plain text paste that begins with the string %%tana%%.

Nodes

Nodes are prepended by - (a dash and a space) and indentation indicates children.

References

References are defined with double brackets [[ ]]

  • This will look for a node in the Library of the current workspace matching that name. If none exists, a new node will be created and linked to. Multiple links with the same string will always point at the same node.
  • You can also specify a node target using [[link name^nodeID]]. If the nodeID does not exist, it will fall back to using the link name.
  • If you only supply a nodeID, and it does not exist, it will create a link to "undefined", which you can later rename.
  • If you also specify the tag of the link, like so: [[Wes Anderson #person]], it will find a node named Wes Anderson and tagged #person anywhere in your graph, and link to that, or create a new node in the library with the provided tag.

Fields

Fields use :: between the field name and the value.

  • Fields will look up by string, but if they are nested underneath a supertag which has any fields with that name, Tana will prioritize the field from the supertag definition.
  • ✨New stricter requirements for matching existing fields:
    • ^nodeID::field value
      This will work if nodeID is a field that exists in a loaded workspace
    • someTitle^nodeID::field value
      If nodeID is a field in a workspace that is not loaded this will not work, use [[someTitle^nodeID]]::field value instead
    • foo^bar::field value
      This will not work, since bar is not an actual nodeID that exists
  • If the field has a type of option or instance, and the provided value matches perfectly with an existing option or instance, the existing option or instance will be linked even if the text in the Tana Paste is not a link.
  • Fields with multiple values can be specified through - [[field name]]:: and then the values nested and indented underneath (also prepended with dashes)

Supertags

Tags use #, and multi-word tag names can optionally be wrapped in [[]], so either #bug or #[[my ideas]].

  • If no tag exists, a new one will be created.
  • If you want to specify a specific tag, use ^ like #bug^nodeID. It will fall back to the string name, and if no string is provided and the nodeID doesn't match, the tag will not be created.
  • You can link to a tag using [[#tag]] (especially useful in search nodes)

Search node

Add %%search%% to a node to make it a search node, with the search expression indented under.

In a search expression, we recognize system nodes like Set/Not set and field operators like LINKS TO, OWNER etc.

Views

You can set the view of a node, using %%view:table%%, %%view:cards%%, %%view:tabs%%, or %%view:calendar%%.

Dates

Simple dates look like this: [[date:2021-02]].

  • They can include time [[date:2021-02-01 20:30]], or only include the week [[date:2021-W02]], month [[date:2021-02]] or year [[date:2021]]
  • Durations are written like [[date:2021-02/2021-04-05]].
  • We also still support the old format [[August 22nd, 2020]].

Checkboxes

Checkboxes use [ ] and [x] at the beginning of a node to indicate checked or unchecked.

  • For fields/nodes which already have a checkbox, providing the [ ] will not change anything, but for other nodes/fields it will insert a checkbox.
  • In all cases, [x] will correctly set the checkbox as checked.

Other

Related FAQs

Examples

  • Can I create search nodes using Tana Paste?
    Sep 26, 2024

    Yes you can: We have a basic syntax for this which you can read about here.

    Example of a task search:

    %%tana%%
    - %%search%% Fei's tasks
      - OR::
        - [[#task]]
        - [[#CS todo]]
      - Assigned to::
        - [[Fei-Ling Tseng]]
      - NOT DONE

    When I paste the above, this is the result:

    Related docs: .
  • How to use Tana Paste with supertags that have non-alphanumeric characters?
    Sep 26, 2024

    Tana Paste can usually parse supertags that are one word, such as #task. If a supertag has spaces, numbers or irregular characters, try wrapping the name in double brackets like this:

    #[[1'3$4'6]]

    If you want to grab the supertag definition, include the hashtag within the brackets, like this:

    [[#1'3$4'6]]

    Related docs: .
  • How can I add supertags on things that I send from Tana Capture?
    Sep 26, 2024

    While it isn't possible to tag things when you're sending things from Tana Capture, you can have Tana do some post-processing magic to convert written-out tags to real tags once they arrive the Inbox—no AI needed!

    1. This method uses a simple Tana Paste command that you can run on the Inbox node, which targets all new children that have "#" in them.
    2. Once you've created the command, you must add it to the On child added section of the Inbox node. You can find it by running the command Debug node on the title of the Inbox.

    Here's Theo describing the command:

    "All it does is paste the nodes that have # in them and that are not tagged, using Tana Paste.

    Say we add this through Tana Capture:

    buy milk #todo

    The command will paste that exact text back in with Tana Paste, where ${name} is buy milk #todo and ${sys:content} are any child notes that are present. Using Tana Paste, #todo will be added as a tag.

    Note: this creates a new node, so the created date will change, meaning you’ll lose the time that the node was captured through Tana Capture."

    Related docs: .

Question

  • Can a command move the current node to a field of a new node?
    Sep 26, 2024

    Yes, you can. Make a new command node, and use the command Insert Tana Paste with the following prompt:

    - ${name} #note
      - Based on:: [[^${sys:nodeId}]]

    The first line is the new node. It uses the name of the current node to inform the name of the new node by using the title expression ${name}. The supertag #note can be enough for Tana to find the right tag to use, but you can specify it more precisely by adding the ^nodeID to it. See the Tana Paste doc for more info on this convention. To retrieve the nodeID of a supertag, run the command Copy link (HTML formatted) on a supertag definition and paste the results. It will paste with the nodeID written out:

    The second line is the field. After the name of the field and the double-colon :: is a reference to the current node that the command is being run on, which it is able to target by retrieving the nodeID of the current node using the title expression ${sys:nodeId}.

    This is what the command node should look like:

    Special thanks to Navigator Emmanuel Galanos for this clever solution!

    Related docs: .