Possibly a stupid question, but can you create a template in Drafts that will, at the press of a button, pull up said template for editing?

@AndyNicolaides I'm a long-time non-power user of Drafts. I would love to be able to do this. I haven't really tried to figure out if it's possible, so hoping maybe someone else here will know. 😇

@jean I feel we could run a dandy, if potentially trademark infringing, podcast called "Mac Non-power Users."

@ChrisJWilson @jean “Low-Power Users” 😜

@yatil @chrisjwilson It’s amusing that my non-nerd friends think I am a power user. Hey, if we form a Drafts user group, it would be a DUG.

(WTF, no shovel emoji?)

@AndyNicolaides @jean I've never looked into Drafts before this post, but it seems very hackable. You can do whatever you want, more or less, in many different ways. If I understand your question correctly, you want to create new drafts prefilled with boilerplate content.

The action New Draft with Template might be what you're looking for. If not, maybe you could cook something up with URL Schemes? For example, the following URL will create a new draft with "Hello, World!" as content: drafts://x-callback-url/create?text=Hello%2C%20World!. A third alternative is to create a custom Shortcut.

@AndyNicolaides @jean And a fourth alternative is to create your own action. 😊 Automating Drafts to Create Custom Documents in Seconds describes the process.

@AndyNicolaides Yup. You can. I currently use one for my journaling that I then export to DayOne.

@sod I can’t imagine the possibilities you will create if you get into Drafts.

@AndyNicolaides Not sure a template is needed. You can use the Post to Micro.blog with Title action available in the Drafts directory.

The first line will be the title (minus the pound sign and space) and everything below that will be the content. If there is no “# “ on the first line, the entire draft is assumed to be the content and no title will be added.

There are a few other Micro.blog actions available here

@jomalo yeah I have that action, but that doesn’t take care of a template. I have a certain format of post I use, with an image at the top, a footer and a ‘read more’ link in the middle so this wouldn’t do that.

@sod @jean ahh, thank you, this template action should do the trick I think! I’ll give it a try.

@jomalo thank you for sharing these!

@yatil considering my phones worsening battery life, this is an even more apt suggestion.

@ChrisJWilson Is the Apple’s Battery Replacement service available in Poland? It seems cheaper than most people expect and if the other features of the phone are still sufficient, it might be a good option.

@yatil It is, and I have a prompt suggesting I get it...I guess I'm avoiding it so I have an excuse to upgrade my phone although I doubt that will happen this year!

@pratik I was thinking the exact same thing!! It looks like the perfect toy for @sod

@maique @pratik Oh, thank you, you think too highly of me. 😊 Drafts look super-duper awesome and is probably a good fit for most people working with text.

It's not an app I could get into, though, as it does not operate on files. That's a showstopper for me, unfortunately. I need apps to work with the file system for portability and compatibility with other tools and platforms.

@sod I get it 🙂 But I DO have you in the highest regard possible 🙂

@sod I too mean it since I'm sure I don't even scratch the surface on what you can do with Drafts. For the longest time, I was intimidated by it so didn't use it.

BTW what do you mean by "operate on files". All the content is saved on iCloud by default but you can export it to any file system you want.

@pratik Yes, import and export are possible, but Drafts does not work natively with files. So, for example, you can't access drafts via Finder or the terminal. At least not without manually exporting them first (and then importing them again if changes were made). That's way too much trouble for me.

But, again, I'm weird in that way. I'm very unixy if that makes sense. My content must reside in plaintext files because my workflow, tools, and scripts revolve around and operate on files.

@sod @AndyNicolaides New Draft with Template is exactly what I needed. So easy. I just needed to add the tag "template" to my M.E.O.W. Draft! 🙏

Drafts is so powerful, and I often feel overwhelmed by so much power, which is why I described myself as a non-power user.

@sod Ah! Got it. Makes sense. So other apps like iA Writer, etc.?

@AndyNicolaides I see this has already been answered but its super easy. I have templates set up for the way I want to format game recaps on my other MB page. Super easy to do.

@jasonekratz @AndyNicolaides this type of thing works great with Mimi. You can upload the picture and get the link. Then you paste it in to Drafts for your post.

@pratik Sorry, what was the question? 😊 If iA Writer operates on files? I wouldn't know for sure, but it looks like that based on the screenshots on their website.

@sod Yes, that's what I meant. Trying to differentiate between the apps. iA Writer, Obsidian, etc. link to local files whereas Drafts, Ulysses, Bear, etc. rely on files in the cloud that need to be exported.

@pratik Yeah, developers have different philosophies and approaches to solving problems. That's good for us! With a diverse offering of apps, there's a higher chance of finding one just right for you.

I love human-readable, portable files. But I also know many folks don't care and are thrilled when they don't have to worry about files, directories, and so on.

And it's not like I only use apps that work directly with files. For example, I have no idea if the stock Contacts app operates on plain text files, a database, or whatever, and I don't care in that case. 😊 I stay away from software with no export options at all, though.

@jasonekratz Yup! Sorry. Mistook “siloed database” for “in the cloud”. I still have Bear but not subscribed to its cloud sync premium plan.