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Version: v2.2.1

Examples

In this section, we collected some examples of what is possible with Espanso, so that you can both learn new techniques and take inspiration for your own use-cases.

tip

If you have an example that would benefit others, feel free to suggest the addition on GitHub! :)

Populating a Form's choice control with the result of a shell command

The following example shows how you could use the output of a shell command to populate a form's choice/list control. In this case, the match can be used to implement a rudimentary file-picker:

  - trigger: ":file"
replace: "{{form1.file}}"
vars:
- name: files
type: shell
params:
cmd: "find ~/Documents -maxdepth 1"
- name: form1
type: form
params:
layout: |
Select file:
[[file]]
fields:
file:
type: list
values: "{{files}}"

Regex for categorizing your matches

Sometimes it's hard to remember all triggers, so it's extremely useful to use regex triggers. As an example let's say you want to structure your matches as:

  • Code snippets
    • Python
    • JavaScript
  • Contacts
    • Name
    • Email

So in your base.yml file you can do:

  - regex: "(code|cd) (all|py) (all|pr)" # Code Category - Python Subcategory - Print
replace: "print(\"Hello World\")"

- regex: "(code|cd) (all|py) (all|fn)" # Code Category - Python Subcategory - Function
replace: "def myPythonFunction():"

- regex: "(code|cd) (all|js) (all|fn)" # Code Category - Javascript Subcategory - Function
replace: "function main(){}"

- regex: "(contact|ct) (all|n) (all|jj)" # Contact Category - Name Subcategory - John Jacobs
replace: "John Jacobs"

- regex: "(contact|ct) (all|n) (all|js)" # Contact Category - Name Subcategory - John Stuart
replace: "John Stuart"

- regex: "(contact|ct) (all|e) (all|jj)" # Contact Category - Email Subcategory - John Jacobs
replace: "john.jacobs@example.com"

This way you can type "code py all" when you know you want a python snippet, but don't remember which ones you have.

You can also use a label so it's even more organized on the search bar. I usually use the trigger at the end of the label, so I can remember next time. Like this:

  - regex: "(code|cd) (all|py) (all|pr)" # Code Category - Python Subcategory - Print
label: "Code - Python - Print - 'cd py pr'"
replace: "print(\"Hello World\")"

Observations:

  • You can also just use the "search bar + label" instead of "regex + match disambiguation" to categorize. But I find easier to use regex so I can incrementally learn my triggers (also I don't need to press Alt + Space to open the search bar).
  • I don't use spaces in regex so I avoid accidental triggers, and I also prefer abbreviations. So instead of "code py all" I use "cdpyaa".

Donate

Hi! I'm Federico, the creator of espanso. I develop espanso in my (little) spare time and I decided to make it open source because I thought it could be useful to many people.

If you liked the project, please consider making a small donation, it really helps :)

A special thanks goes to all the wonderful people who supported espanso along the way

Together, we will make espanso the first universal text expander, open to everyone.

Contributing

Espanso is open source and hosted on GitHub.

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If you find a bug or have an idea for a new feature, please open an issue on GitHub.