Reference Extravaganza

Reference Extravaganza is a Thymer plugin for references. It does three things:

• Reference a line of text inline: type [[, search, and link any line in your workspace.
• Alias a reference: change what any reference chip displays (a page reference or an inline [[ text reference), without retyping or recreating the link.
• Inline Transclusion: expand a selected reference in place to reveal what it points to inline, right under it, then collapse it again.

Reference a line of text with [[

Thymer references a whole page out of the box; this adds references to an individual line.

1. Type [[ anywhere in a line. A search box opens right at your cursor.
2. Keep typing to search. Results show a snippet centred on the match (matched words highlighted) with the source page beneath.
   • Phrase search: results match the phrase you type.
   • Multi-term search: use + to require several terms in the same line, in any order (for example bestäm + leda).
3. Pick a line with ↑/↓ then Enter, or click it. A reference to that line is inserted, displaying the line's text.
4. Esc cancels and removes the [[ you typed.

The box opens at the caret and the editor keeps focus, so it works mid-sentence and with several references in one paragraph.

Alias a reference

Works on both page references and the line references you create with [[.

1. Select the reference you want to alias.
2. Run Set alias for reference, either from the Command Palette (Cmd+P / Ctrl+P) or with its keyboard shortcut, Cmd+Shift+A (macOS) / Ctrl+Shift+A (Windows/Linux).
3. A small box opens right under the reference, pre-filled with its current text (or your current alias, if you've already set one).
   • Keep part of the text: trim the box down to just what you want, no retyping.
   • Type a fresh alias: click the × to clear the box, then type.
   • Clear the alias: clear the box and press Enter. A page reference reverts to the page's real name; a line reference re-syncs to the target line's current text.
   • Save with Enter, cancel with Esc.

The box opens under the reference, follows your theme (light or dark), and uses Thymer's accent for the Save button.

Changing the keyboard shortcut

The default is Cmd+Shift+A (macOS) / Ctrl+Shift+A (Windows/Linux). To rebind it, run Set alias keyboard shortcut from the Command Palette, press the keys you want, and click Save. It applies immediately, with no restart and no JSON. (You can also set custom.shortcut directly in the Configuration tab, e.g. Mod+Shift+L; Mod = Cmd on macOS, Ctrl elsewhere. At least one of Cmd/Ctrl/Alt is required, so the shortcut can't clash with plain typing.)

Inline Transclusion

See what a reference points to without leaving the page you're on.

1. Select the reference (a page reference or a [[ line reference).
2. Press Cmd+Down (macOS) / Ctrl+Down (Windows/Linux) to expand it. The referenced content appears inline, nested right under the reference: a line reference shows that line and its children; a page reference shows the page's content. It's the real thing, so you can edit it in place and your changes save to the source.
3. Press Cmd+Up / Ctrl+Up to collapse it again.

Under the hood this is a native Thymer transclusion, added while expanded and removed when you collapse. (A page's properties aren't part of a transclusion, so an expanded page shows its body content rather than its fields.)

Installation

1. In Thymer, open the Command Palette (Cmd+P / Ctrl+P), run Plugins, and click Create Plugin under Global Plugins.
2. In the plugin's dialog, go to the code editor (click Edit as Code if you see the settings view).
3. In the Custom Code tab, replace the contents with plugin.js.
4. In the Configuration tab, replace the contents with plugin.json.
5. Click Save.

Don't enable Hot Reload — it's a development feature and can leave the plugin in a state where saved data stops persisting.

How it works

• An "alias" in Thymer is just the title field on a reference segment ({type:"ref", text:{guid, title?}}). The plugin reads and writes that field — set it to your alias, or clear it to fall back to the target's name (the page's title for a page reference, the line's current text for a line reference). Nothing else on the line is touched, and the link target never changes.
• A [[ line reference targets a line item rather than a page; the plugin inserts it as the same ref segment, with the line's text as the initial title.
• It finds the reference you're on from the editor's current selection when you run the command.
• Expanding a reference inserts a native transclusion of the target as a child of the reference's block; collapsing removes it. The expanded content is the real editor, so edits save to the source.
• Negligible idle cost: the only always-on code is a few keydown listeners (the shortcut, the [[ trigger, the expand chord), each of which rejects non-matching keystrokes on its first line, so normal typing pays a couple of cheap comparisons. No observers, no polling, no work on scroll or render.

License

MIT