save-term

# Save term Save a term or phrase as a Term note in `02-Evergreen/Terms/`. Two modes: 1. **Encountered** — a term lifted from a book, article, conversation, or other external source. Body anchors on a source citation + quote. 2. **Coined** — a term that emerged during conversation (often a compact replacement for a wordy phrase, or a fresh concept the user wants to lock in). Body is a brief gloss with a usage example or context. This skill is **not** for general note-taking. It writes one specific shape of note — short, atomic, and aligned with the existing vault Term convention. For broader capture, use `save-napkin-note`. ## Defer to AGENTS.md / CLAUDE.md Vault layout, metadata semantics, and tool-choice rules live in the vault's `AGENTS.md` and `CLAUDE.md`. This skill only adds the procedure for writing one note type. When unsure about a field's meaning or which tool to use for vault writes, read those first. ## Arguments - **`$ARGUMENTS`**: the term or phrase to save. If omitted, ask. If the term contains punctuation tricky for filenames (`/`, `:`, etc.), confirm a filesystem-safe variant before writing. ## Process ### 1. Determine mode Ask if not obvious from context: - **Encountered** — user is referencing something external (a book, article, person they're quoting, web clipping). Need a source. - **Coined** — emerged in this conversation, no external source. Likely came out of a phrase-revision pass or a fresh framing. ### 2. Gather what the body needs For **encountered** terms: - **Source citation** — wikilink to an existing vault note if possible (`[[Source note title]]`), otherwise a markdown link to the URL with the article/book title as link text. Check `04-Entities/` and `03-Records/Clippings/` for an existing source note before defaulting to a raw URL. - **Quote** — verbatim passage from the source that defines or illustrates the term. Use a blockquote (`>`). Don't paraphrase. - Optional: brief framing sentence above the quote if needed for context, though most existing Term notes go straight to the quote. For **coined** terms: - **Gloss** — 1–2 sentences defining the term in plain language. The user's own wording is preferable to your phrasing — pull from the conversation if a clean definition already exists there. - **Usage example or context** — optionally, the wordy phrase it replaces (if it came from a phrase-revision pass) or a sentence showing it in use. - **Optional source** — if it was inspired by something external, link or cite it lightly. ### 3. Pick an icon (optional but encouraged) Existing Term notes usually have a Lucide icon in frontmatter (e.g., `icon: LiFilter`, `icon: LiWaves`). If you can suggest a fitting one, do — otherwise leave the field blank rather than guessing badly. The `suggest-lucide-icons` skill is the right tool when the user wants help picking one. ### 4. Find related notes Search the vault briefly for adjacent Term notes or concept notes (`02-Evergreen/`) that this term connects to. Two or three is plenty — these populate `## See also`. Don't force connections; if nothing obvious comes up, leave the section empty or omit it. ### 5. Write the note Path: `02-Evergreen/Terms/{term}.md` **Filename casing**: match the user's preference if they specified one; otherwise default to sentence case for multi-word terms (`Bottleneck optimization.md`) and lowercase for single common-noun terms (`burnout.md`). Existing examples are mixed — don't agonize over it. **Filename collision**: before writing, check if the file exists. If it does, surface to the user — don't silently overwrite. Options: append to the existing note, pick a more specific filename, or abort. **Frontmatter shape** (matching existing Term notes): ```yaml --- icon: Li{LucideIconName} # optional publish: false related: # optional, omit if empty - "[[Adjacent term]]" tags: - {topical tags} - evergreen - terms created: {ISO timestamp} modified: {ISO timestamp} --- ``` `evergreen` and `terms` tags are required — they're how the vault identifies these notes. **Body shape — encountered mode**: ```markdown [[Source note]]: > Verbatim quote that defines or illustrates the term. Multiple paragraphs of the source can be stacked as separate blockquote lines. > Another excerpt if relevant. ## See also - [[Related term]] - [[Related concept]] ``` **Body shape — coined mode**: ```markdown 1–2 sentence gloss in plain language. The phrase or context that prompted it can sit below as a usage example or as a quoted line. > Optional: original phrase being replaced, or a sentence using the term. ## See also - [[Related term]] ``` ### 6. Confirm Show the resulting wikilink (`[[Term name]]`) and a one-line summary of what was saved. If a daily-log bullet is warranted (per the vault's write-back discipline), mention it but don't auto-write — that's a separate decision. ## Tool choice Per `AGENTS.md`, prefer Obsidian CLI when the desktop app is running. For new file creation in a known location, the `Write` tool is fine and direct. Read existing Term files with `obsidian read file="<term>"` to check for collisions and to study tone/length when in doubt. ## Examples **Encountered**: ``` User: /save-term affordance [skill asks for source] User: From Don Norman's Design of Everyday Things — there's a clipping at [[The Design of Everyday Things - Norman]] [skill drafts the note with that source + a quote pulled from the clipping] ``` **Coined (post phrase-revision)**: ``` User: /save-term ambient drafting [skill confirms it's coined, asks for a quick gloss] User: writing in the background while doing other things — the prose accretes rather than gets composed [skill drafts a short coined-mode note, suggests `LiPenLine` for icon] ``` ## What not to do - Don't paraphrase source quotes in encountered mode. Verbatim only. - Don't invent metadata fields not in the existing convention (no `category`, no `type`, etc.) — keep frontmatter minimal. - Don't write ambient prose around the term. Term notes are tight scrapbook entries, not essays. - Don't set `publish: true` on a new Term note. Default is `publish: false` so the note can ripen privately first; the user flips it on themselves when it's ready. - Don't auto-update STATUS or other vault state. This skill writes one file.