[Remind-Fans] Need more text per event re: Remind fan

[Tim Chase]

On 2021-05-11 07:23, LarryD wrote:
> I just started with "remind" and I like it.

Welcome!

> I have been trying to find a way to attach a file (at least text
> only) to any "REM" I add.

There are a couple of different ways to go about this depending on
how you want the results.  If you just used the command-line `rem` or
`remind` invocation, the most simple way would be to use the RUN
directive something like

  REM Jun 1 2021 RUN cat zoom_meeting_notes.txt

However, this doesn't actually slurp all that content into the
reminder, so it doesn't show up if you're using the `-c` week/month
calendar, nor does it show up in tkremind.

Another option would be to use the shell() function to incorporate
the file as included data:

  REM Jun 1 2021 MSF %"Zoom staff meeting%" [ \
    shell("cat meeting_notes.txt", -1)]

You can keep all your notes in individual files, or you can use some
post-processing to keep them in a single file.  I tried this

  FSET external_note(marker) \
    "sed -n '/BEGIN: *" + marker + "$/,/END: *" + marker + "$/p' " + \
    filedir() + "/calnotes.txt"

allowing me to keep my notes in a single file called calnotes.txt and
then add blocks to it like

  BEGIN: Staff meeting
  here are a bunch of notes
  with Zoom reminder links
  and phone numbers
  and more notes from the meeting
  added later
  END: Staff meeting

and then I used

  REM Jun 1 2021 RUN [external_note("Staff meeting")]

I imagine something similar would work with the shell() method.

> The reason for the additional file is that I often need more
> information about an event. 

One can also use `IF defined("VARNAME")` tests to change function
definitions, so you might do something like

  IF defined("VERBOSE")
    FSET load_details(fname) shell("cat " + fname, -1)
  ELSE
    FSET load_details(fname) ""
  END

  REM Jun 1 2021 MSG %"Staff meeting%" [load_details("staffmtg.txt")]

That way, if you invoke remind with

  $ rem -iVERBOSE=1

it will pull in all those details but if you invoke it without that
"-iVERBOSE=1" it won't.  I don't use tkremind, but according to the
man-page, it passes through -i parameters to the underlying remind,
so it should support doing something similar at least when you launch
tkremind.

For your particular case, I have a zoom() function exactly for such
details, taking the meeting name, the Zoom ID, and password. It then
optionally colorizes it based on other -i arguments (-iCOLOR=1) and
then formats it in an easy-to-read format.  I don't include meeting
notes or longer text, but the above should give you some parts that
might assemble into a solution that meets your needs.

-tim