EmacsConf backstage: jumping to and working with talks using Embark
| emacs, emacsconfIn the course of organizing and running EmacsConf, I often need to jump to or act on specific talks. I have a function that jumps to the talk heading so that I can look up additional information or add notes.
emacsconf-go-to-talk: Jump to the talk heading matching SEARCH.
(defun emacsconf-go-to-talk (search)
"Jump to the talk heading matching SEARCH."
(interactive (list (emacsconf-complete-talk)))
(find-file emacsconf-org-file)
(widen)
(cond
((plist-get search :slug)
(goto-char (org-find-property "SLUG" (plist-get search :slug))))
((emacsconf-get-slug-from-string search)
(goto-char (org-find-property "SLUG" (emacsconf-get-slug-from-string search))))
(t
(goto-char
(catch 'found
(org-map-entries
(lambda ()
(when (string-match search
(cons
(concat (org-entry-get (point) "SLUG") " - "
(org-entry-get (point) "ITEM") " - "
(org-entry-get (point) "NAME") " - "
(org-entry-get (point) "EMAIL"))
(point)))
(throw 'found (point))))
"SLUG={.}")))))
(org-reveal))
Most of the work is done in a completion function that makes it easy to specify a talk using the slug (talk ID), title, or speaker names.
emacsconf-complete-talk: Offer talks for completion.
(defun emacsconf-complete-talk (&optional info)
"Offer talks for completion.
If INFO is specified, limit it to that list."
(let ((choices
(if (and (null info) emacsconf-complete-talk-cache)
emacsconf-complete-talk-cache
(mapcar (lambda (o)
(string-join
(delq nil
(mapcar (lambda (f) (plist-get o f))
'(:slug :title :speakers :irc)))
" - "))
(or info (emacsconf-get-talk-info))))))
(completing-read
"Talk: "
(lambda (string predicate action)
(if (eq action 'metadata)
'(metadata (category . emacsconf))
(complete-with-action action choices string predicate))))))
In addition to jumping to the Org heading for a talk, there are a bunch of other things I might want to do. Embark lets me add a bunch of shortcuts for working with a talk. I could open the caption file, edit the talk's wiki page, change a talk's property, e-mail the speaker, or more. Here's the Embark-related code from emacsconf.el:
Embark-related code
;;; Embark
(defun emacsconf-embark-finder ()
"Identify when we're on a talk subtree."
(when (and (derived-mode-p 'org-mode)
(org-entry-get-with-inheritance "SLUG"))
(cons 'emacsconf (org-entry-get-with-inheritance "SLUG"))))
(defun emacsconf-insert-talk-title (search)
"Insert the talk title matching SEARCH."
(interactive (list (emacsconf-complete-talk)))
(insert (plist-get (emacsconf-search-talk-info search) :title)))
(with-eval-after-load 'embark
(add-to-list 'embark-target-finders 'emacsconf-embark-finder)
(defvar-keymap embark-emacsconf-actions
:doc "Keymap for emacsconf-related things"
"a" #'emacsconf-announce
"c" #'emacsconf-find-captions-from-slug
"d" #'emacsconf-find-caption-directives-from-slug
"p" #'emacsconf-set-property-from-slug
"w" #'emacsconf-edit-wiki-page
"s" #'emacsconf-set-start-time-for-slug
"W" #'emacsconf-browse-wiki-page
"u" #'emacsconf-update-talk
"t" #'emacsconf-insert-talk-title
"m" #'emacsconf-mail-speaker-from-slug
"n" #'emacsconf-notmuch-search-mail-from-entry
"f" #'org-forward-heading-same-level
"b" #'org-backward-heading-same-level
"RET" #'emacsconf-go-to-talk)
(add-to-list 'embark-keymap-alist '(emacsconf . embark-emacsconf-actions)))
;;; Status updates
For example, I sometimes need to open the wiki page for a talk in order to update the talk description.
emacsconf-edit-wiki-page: Open the wiki page for the talk matching SEARCH.
;;; Embark
(defun emacsconf-embark-finder ()
"Identify when we're on a talk subtree."
(when (and (derived-mode-p 'org-mode)
(org-entry-get-with-inheritance "SLUG"))
(cons 'emacsconf (org-entry-get-with-inheritance "SLUG"))))
Embark can also act on completion candidates, so I can call any of those actions from my C-c e t shortcut for emacsconf-go-to-talk. This is specified by the (metadata (category . emacsconf)) in emacsconf-complete-talk and the (add-to-list 'embark-keymap-alist '(emacsconf . embark-emacsconf-actions)) in my Embark configuration.
C-. is the embark-act shortcut in my configuration. When I need to
remember what the shortcuts are, I can use C-h
(embark-keymap-help) to list the keyboard shortcuts or select the command with completion.
The code above and related functions are in emacsconf.el or other files in the emacsconf-el repository.