Anki::Import - Anki note generation made easy.
version 0.030
Efficiently generate formatted Anki notes with your text editor for easy import into Anki.
# Step 1: Create the source file
# Step 2: Run the anki_import command
supplied by this module...
# ...from the command line
anki_import path/to/source_file.txt
# or
# ...from within a perl script
use Anki::Import;
anki_import('path/to/source_file.txt');
# Step 3: Import the resultant files into Anki
Inputting notes into Anki can be a tedious chore. Anki::Import lets you
you generate Anki notes with your favorite text editor (e.g. vim, BBEdit, Atom,
etc.) so you can enter formatted notes into Anki's database more efficiently.
At a minimum, you should have basic familiarity with using your computer's command line terminal to make use of this program.
First, you create a specially formatted source file which
Anki::Import will process. The source file is a simple text file with
basic formatting rules you must follow.
See the "General description of the source file" section for details.
Once the source file is created and saved, run the
anki_import command from the command line or from a script to generate the
import files. This will create a new directory called "anki_import_files"
containing one text file for each of the note types generated by Anki::Import
and which you will import in the next step. By default, the directory is
created in the current directory.
See the "USAGE" section for more details and options.
In Anki, open the deck you wish to import and hit Ctrl-I or (Cmd-I on a
Mac) to start the import process, navigate to the a file generated by
Anki::Import and select one of them.
Next, check Anki's settings to be sure you are importing notes into the proper fields, deck and note type. Also ensure you have the "Allow HTML in fields" option enabled and that you have "Fields separated by: Tab" selected.
Click "Import" and repeat for each note type you are importing.
Consult Anki's documentation for more details on importing and managing your notes.
The source file contains one or more Anki notes. To make importing easier, each source file should contain notes that will be imported into the same Anki deck.
Each note in the source file contains fields which should correspond to your existing note types in Anki. Individual notes in the source file are delineated by two or more blank lines. Fields are separated by a single blank line. Fields for each note should be in the same order as your Anki note types to make importing more automatic. All fields must have content or left intentionally blank.
To create an intionally blank field, add a single '`' (backtick) character on a line by itself with blank lines before and after the line with the single backtick.
See the "Source file example" for more help.
The source file should be a plain text file with UTF-8 encoding. UTF-8 is likely the default encoding method for your editor but check your editor's settings and documentation for further details.
Since tab characters are used by Anki to split your fields, you should avoid relying on tab characters in your source file. Any tabs found in your source file will get converted to four spaces.
You can indicate which note type a note belongs to by preceding notes with a
#note_type comment at the beginning of a line. You can choose any note type
name you wish but it is recommended that you use note type names similar to
those that exist in your Anki database to make importing the notes easier.
Note type comments not only assign a note type to the next note, but any notes therafter until a new note type comment is encountered (see the example in the next section). So note type comments actually delineate a note type section. If no note types are indicated in your source file, the "Basic" note type is used.
Note types are used to help Anki::Import ensure other notes of the same type
have the same number of fields. If the notes assigned to a particular note type
do not all have the same number of fields, an error is thrown so be sure each
note has the correct number of fields.
Note: note type sections can be split across the file (i.e. you do not have to group the notes of a particular note type together).
Place your space seprated lit of tags in the last field. As long as there is one more field in the source files that fields in the note you are importing to, Anki will generate tags from the last field.
You can automate tag generation by placing a single '^' (caret) character on a line by itself immediately after your list of tags. These tags will now be used for all later notes in the file until they are overridden by a new list of automated tags. Also any new tags you place at the end of a note will be added to the list of tags that are automatically generated.
To reset the automated list of tags, place a single '^' (caret) character in place of the field where your tags will go.
To suppress the application of an automated tag from the list of automated tags for a particular note, include that tag in the tag field and it will not be tagged with that term for that one note.
To add a new tag to the already existing set of tags, enter the tags on a line followed by a new line with a single '+' sign on it by itself.
Note: If you use tags on any of your notes in a parcitular note type, you must use tags on all of your notes or indicate that the tag field should be left blank with a '`' (backtick) character on a line by itself.
Learning how to format the source file is key to getting Anki to import your
notes properly and getting the most out of Anki::Import.
Following a few simple rules, you can assign notes to a note type, preserve whitespace in fields, create bold text, create blank lines in your fields, add tags, create cloze deletions, indicate which fields are blank and generate simple lists. Study the example below for details.
Note: Lines containing only whitespace characters are treated as blank lines.
Below is an example of how to format a source data file. Note that the column on the right containing comments for this example are not permitted in an actual source data file.
# Basic # We start a note section here. Any
# notes below here to the next
# note type comment are assigned to
# the 'Basic' note type
# You can have blank lines between the
# note type comment and the next
# question.
What is the first day of the week? # Question 1, Field 1
# Blank line here indicates a new field.
Monday. # Question 1, Field 2
# Add two or more blank lines between
questions
How many days of the week are there? # Question 2, Field 1
Our caldendar # Question 2, Field 2
has seven days # Answers can run
in a week # across one or more lines but
# will be imported as a single
# line into Anki.
# less_basic # New note type called "less_basic"
# with 3 fields
What is the third day of week? # Question 3, Field 1
Wednesday # Question 3, Field 2
Wed. # Question 3, Field 3
your_tags go_here # We set up automated tags on this note
^ # with the '^' symbol on a line by itself
# immediately after out tag list.
# These tags will be applied to this and
# all future notes unless overridden.
Put {{{another question}}} here. # Surround text with 3 braces for a cloze
Here is an field that has
` # Insert a blank line into a field
a blank line in it. # with a single backtick character
# surrounded by lines with text.
go_here # We set autotags in the last note and
# they will carry forward to this note
# except for the exclusions we place
# here. This note will *not* be tagged
# with 'go_here' but it will still be
# tagged under 'your_tags'.
What does this code do? # Another less_basic question
``` # Preserve whitespace in a field with 3
This_is_some_code { # backticks on a single line.
` # You must still backtick blank lines
print 'Whitespace will be # when preserving whitespace, however.
preserved';
` # Another blank line.
}
``` # End whitespace preservation
This is %comma,delimted,text% # Bullet lists with %item1,item2,item3%
' # The tags field is left blank. But all
# the auto tags will still be applied.
Another question # Field 1
` # Field 2 is blank.
This is *in bold* # Field 3 has bold words, followed by a
` # blank line, followed by
%an,unordered,list% # an ordered list.
new_tags more_new_tags # This and future notes will use these
^ # newer automated tags.
#basic # switch back to a 'basic' note type
Last question
Last anser
add_this_tag_to_autotags # We add a new_tag to our autotag list
+ # with the '+' sign by itself on a new
# line.
By itself, Anki::Import will make it easier for you to format and
input your notes especially if you do a lot of basic HTML formatting. However,
the huge productivity gains of Anki::Import can only be unlocked by getting
proficient wih your text editor of choice.
For example, you can generate templates for each of the note types you use to
make data entry exceptionally painless. And with a text editor like vim, you
can automate the generation of the formatting codes used by Anki::Import
and make Anki note creation joyful, or at least much less tedious.
Teaching you how to use and optimize your text editor for Anki::Import is
well beyond the scope of this document. But if you take the time now and do the
up front work of learning your text editor and tweaking it for use with
Anki::Import, you will save a lot of time in the long run.
In the future, vim configurations and plugins for use with Anki::Import
may be released as they are developed to help you get going faster with vim.
Unfortunately, other text editors cannot be supported as there are far too many
and far too little time to get familiar with all their features.
anki_import can be run from the command line or from within another perl
script. It behaves the same way in both environments.
The Anki::Import module installs the anki_import command line command
for generating import files which is used as follow:
anki_import source_file [parent_dir] [--verbosity_level]
B<Example:> anki_import pop_quiz.txt /home/me --verbose
anki_import processes the source_file and generates files to be imported into
Anki, one file for each note type. These files are placed in a directory called
anki_import_files. This directory is placed in the current working directory
by default.
Note that previously generated files already located in the anki_import_files
directory the command is outputting to will will be overwritten without warning.
Add a unique (parent_dir path to help prevent this.
parent_dir is an optional argument containing the path you want Anki::Import
to save the files for output. You may use a ~ (tilde) to represent the home
directory for the current user.
$verbosity options can be set to --verbose or --vverbose
(very verbose) or --quiet. The verbosity options have aliases for your
typing convenience: -v, -V and -q, respectively.
Use the --verbose or --vverbose option to help troubleshoot source file
processing issues. The (--quiet) option suppresses the success
message printed upon successful processing of the source file.
Invoking the anki_import function mirrors the arguments used from the
command line:
Usage in a script is the same as for the command line except that the arguments must be enclosed in quotes.
Example:
anki_import('script_file.txt', '/home/me', '--verbose');
See the "Command line usage" for more details on the optional arguments. By
default, the verbosity output from the function call is (--quiet. If you
want the function call to output a success message, use (--no-quiet);
Anki::Import is written in the Perl programming langauge. Therefore, you must
have Perl installed on your system. MacOS and *nix machines will have
Perl already installed but the Windows operating system does not
come pre-installed with Perl and so you may have to install it first before you
can use Anki::Import.
If you are unsure if you have Perl installed, open a command prompt and type in:
perl -v
If Perl is installed, it will report the version of Perl on your machine and other information. If Perl is not installed, you will get a "not recognized" error on Windows.
If you are on Windows and you do not have Perl installed, you can download a version of Perl called "Strawberry Perl" from the Strawberry Perl website. Be sure to install the proper version (64 or 32 bit).
Once installed successfully, see the next section for downloading and installing
Anki::Import.
Anki::Import is easy to install if you have a Perl module called
App::cpanimus installed. This module provides a command, cpanm, to easily
downloading and installing modules from the Perl module repository called
CPAN. Simply run this command from the command line to install
Anki::Import:
cpanm Anki::Import
Strawberry Perl for Windows has the cpanm already installed.
If you do not have the cpan command on your computer, you will need to use
either the older CPAN shell method of installation or, as a last resort, perform
manual installation. Refer to the
Anki::Import INSTALL file
for further details on these installation methods.
You can find documentation for this module with the perldoc command.
perldoc Anki::Import
The following websites have more information about this module, and may be of help to you. As always, in addition to those websites please use your favorite search engine to discover more resources.
-
MetaCPAN
A modern, open-source CPAN search engine, useful to view POD in HTML format.
The code is open to the world, and available for you to hack on. Please feel free to browse it and play with it, or whatever. If you want to contribute patches, please send me a diff or prod me to pull from your repository :)
https://github.com/sdondley/Anki-Import
git clone git://github.com/sdondley/Anki-Import.git
You can make new bug reports, and view existing ones, through the web interface at https://github.com/sdondley/Anki-Import/issues.
Steve Dondley [email protected]
This software is copyright (c) 2018 by Steve Dondley.
This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.