Tip: Bases formula to link to a parent Folder Note

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I drafted this as a help request – then revisited the problem before posting it and figured it out.
Sharing the solution, as I’m pretty pleased with Base formulas can do!

What I’m trying to do

I have a very simple project & task structure.

Project files live in folders with paths like:
Projects/Torment_Nexus

Project “home” notes are Folder Notes auto-named after the parent folder:
Projects/Torment_Nexus/Torment_Nexus.md

A central task base lists any active notes in project folders throughout the vault. I’d like the entries to include links to their project home pages – the Folder Notes.

Things I have tried

The formula Link(file.folder) comes close, but it doesn’t know about Folder Notes. The result is a link to a non-existent note at:
Projects/Torment_Nexus.md

So…

I know I could put a link in a “Project” property for every note – but I’d like to just leverage the consistent folder structure I already have.

Is there any way to build a formula that will link to the relevant parent Folder Note?

Answer: yes!

After some experimenting with the functions split and slice:

link(
file.folder + "/" + 
file.folder.split("/").slice(-1) + ".md", 
file.folder.split("/").slice(-1)
)

This formula builds a link in this order:

file.folder + "/" +
  • Get the file.folder (“Projects/Torment_Nexus”)
  • Append a / character so it’s ready for the filename (“Projects/Torment_Nexus/_________”)
file.folder.split("/").slice(-1) + ".md",
  • split the original folder path by the pre-existing “/” to get parts: ["Projects", "Torment_Nexus"]
  • Use slice(-1) to back up one step from the end and extract the folder as the project name (“Torment_Nexus”)
  • Append .md to that element to make the Folder Note filename (“Torment_Nexus.md”)
  • Combine it all to form the full path to the Folder Note: “/Projects/Torment_Nexus/Torment_Nexus.md”
file.folder.split("/").slice(-1)
  • After the comma in the formula, split & grab the project name element (“Torment_Nexus”) again as a second ‘display’ parameter for the link, so we don’t have to see the full path.

The result is the link:
[Torment_Nexus](Projects/Torment_Nexus/Torment_Nexus.md)

image
image905×104 8.44 KB

Perfect. Thanks, me! Maybe this’ll help someone else too.

(tasks.base code view) 
filters:
  and:
    - '!file.name.startsWith("Project")'
formulas:
  folder link: |-
    link(file.folder + "/" + file.folder.split("/").slice(-1) + ".md", file.folder.split("/").slice(-1)
    )
views:
  - type: table
    name: active
    filters:
      and:
        - status.containsAny("next", "active")
        - formula["folder link"].startsWith("Project")
    order:
      - file.name
      - status
      - formula.folder link
    sort:
      - property: formula.folder link
        direction: ASC
      - property: date created
        direction: DESC