EtherPK User Docs

Scoped Concepts

A name can contain another link. [[[[Physics]] Quantum Mechanics]] names "Quantum Mechanics within Physics": a page of its own, separate from [[Quantum Mechanics]] and from [[Physics]]. The inner link is the scope; the rest is what distinguishes the page within it. Nesting can go as deep as you need, and a name can carry more than one scope.

- [[[[Physics]] Quantum Mechanics]] has a page of its own
- so does [[[[Physics]] [[History]] The Solvay Conference]]

Use it wherever a plain name would be ambiguous or too general: [[[[Acme]] Roadmap]] beside [[[[Initech]] Roadmap]], or a person's page beside their namesake.

How it reads and writes

  • Typing. Type [[ for the outer link, then [[ again for the scope; the link menu offers names in either slot. Or select the text [[Physics]] Quantum Mechanics and press [ twice.
  • In the editor the whole thing is one underlined link, and each part opens its own page: click on Physics to open Physics, click anywhere else to open the scoped page. Each part has its own dashed underline while it has no page.
  • In Quick Find and Search the brackets read as spaces: physics quantum finds it. The brackets are never typed there.
  • On a published site the name renders as chained links, Physics then Quantum Mechanics, each pointing at its page, and the page's address is physics-quantum-mechanics.html.
  • In a local graph the file keeps its brackets: pages/[[Physics]] Quantum Mechanics.md. Square brackets are legal in file names on every system.

A page named [[Physics]] Quantum Mechanics counts as a reference to Physics by its name alone. Physics exists as a concept from that page's existence, before it has a page or a link anywhere in a body: it appears in Quick Find and Search, the link menu offers it, and its Backlinks panel lists the scoped page under a Title label. A folder of files named this way brings its subjects with it without a single link in the text.

Renaming a scope

Rename Physics and every page scoped by it is renamed with it: [[Physics]] Quantum Mechanics becomes [[Natural Philosophy]] Quantum Mechanics, and every link to it is rewritten or the old name kept as an alias, as you choose. The rename dialog lists the scoped documents that will move before you confirm, and says where any of them would land on a name that already exists and merge into it. See Titles Aliases And Frontmatter.

Editing the inner part of a scoped link in place is a rename of the scope; editing the outer part is a rename of the scoped page.

Where scoped names come from on import

An import turns Logseq namespaces (physics/quantum) and Obsidian pages whose names clash across folders into scoped concepts (Importing From Logseq Obsidian Or EtherPK).