Configuration File Reference
jrnl stores its information in a YAML configuration file.
Note
Backup your journal and config file before editing. Changes to the config file can have destructive effects on your journal!
Config location
You can find your configuration file location by running:
jrnl --list
By default, the configuration file is ~/.config/jrnl/jrnl.yaml.
If you have the XDG_CONFIG_HOME variable set, the configuration
file will be saved as $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/jrnl/jrnl.yaml.
Note
On Windows, the configuration file is typically found at
%USERPROFILE%\.config\jrnl\jrnl.yaml.
Config format
The configuration file is a YAML file and can be edited with a text editor.
Config keys
journals
Describes each journal used by jrnl. Each indented key after this key is
the name of a journal.
If a journal key has a value, that value will be interpreted as the path
to the journal. Otherwise, the journal needs the additional indented key
journal to specify its path.
All keys below can be specified for each journal at the same level as the
journal key. If a key conflicts with a top-level key, the journal-specific
key will be used instead.
editor
If set, executes this command to launch an external editor for
writing and editing your entries. The path to a temporary file
is passed after it, and jrnl processes the file once
the editor returns control to jrnl.
Some editors require special options to work properly, since they must be
blocking processes to work with jrnl. See External Editors
for details.
encrypt
If true, encrypts your journal using AES. Do not change this
value for journals that already have data in them.
template
The path to a text file to use as a template for new entries. Only works when you
have the editor field configured. If you use a template, the editor's
temporary files
will have the same extension as the template.
tagsymbols
Symbols to be interpreted as tags.
Note
Although it seems intuitive to use the #
character for tags, there's a drawback: on most shells, this is
interpreted as a meta-character starting a comment. This means that if
you type
jrnl Implemented endless scrolling on the #frontend of our website.
your bash will chop off everything after the # before passing it to
jrnl. To avoid this, wrap your input into quotation marks like
this:
jrnl "Implemented endless scrolling on the #frontend of our website."
Or use the built-in prompt or an external editor to compose your entries.
default_hour and default_minute
Entries will be created at this time if you supply a date but no specific time (for example, last thursday).
timeformat
Defines how to format the timestamps as they are stored in your journal. See the python docs for reference.
Do not change this for an existing journal, since that might lead to data loss.
Note
jrnl doesn't support the %z or %Z time zone identifiers.
highlight
If true, tags will be highlighted in cyan.
linewrap
Controls the width of the output. Set to false if you don't want to
wrap long lines. Set to auto to let jrnl automatically determine
the terminal width.
colors
A dictionary that controls the colors used to display journal entries.
It has four subkeys, which are: body, date, tags, and title.
Current valid values are: BLACK, RED, GREEN, YELLOW, BLUE,
MAGENTA, CYAN, WHITE, and NONE.
colorama.Fore is used for colorization, and you can find the docs here.
To disable colored output, set the value to NONE.
display_format
Specifies formatter to use by default. See formats.
version
jrnl automatically updates this field to the version that it is running.
There is no need to change this field manually.