This package provides a simple way to treat text in a buffer
as a template with placeholders where text needs to be filled in. Any
occurrence of <++> in the buffer is a placeholder. You can navigate
among the placeholder with the placeholder-forward and
placeholder-backward commands. They move the point to the next
placeholder in the specified direction and delete the placeholder so
you can immediately start typing the text that should replace it.
However, if you call them again immediately after, they restore that
occurrence of the placeholder and move to the next.
The placeholder in only <++> by default, it can be changed by
customizing the placeholder-string variable.
A placeholder-insert command is also provided, to insert the
placeholder string.
I suggest the following keybindings:
| Command | Keybinding |
|---|---|
placeholder-forward | C-S-n |
placeholder-backward | C-S-p |
placeholder-insert | C-S-x (X marks the spot!) |
Why not just use YASnippet or the built-in Skeletons or Tempo libraries? All of these great packages are much more featureful and ambitious than Placeholder, but they require defining the template in advance and arranging for some way to insert it in a buffer: naming the template or binding it to a key. This makes perfect sense for templates you plan to use many times, like for loops or CommonMark code blocks, or other things people typically make snippets for. But it can feel like too much work if you just want to leave some spots marked in your buffer to fill in later, or to make bespoke templates you only ever plan to use a few times. In those situations Placeholder might be a better fit.
For example, I often want to write several similar but not identical emails to different people. I write the first one right in the message buffer using placeholders and put the text in a register. Then I repeatedly insert the template, fill it out and send the email.