Text expansion

Snippets

Assign a short trigger to text you type often. Typing the trigger in any app replaces it with the full text — an address, an email, or today’s date.

Start with a trigger

Open Settings → Snippets → Edit. Each entry has a trigger, an optional description for the launcher, and the text to insert.

{
  "trigger": "@@",
  "description": "Email address",
  "replace": "john.smith@gmail.com"
}

Triggers are matched case-insensitively. Keep them distinct and specific enough that they are unlikely to appear in normal writing.

Where snippets live

Snippets live inside your LaunchKnife config, normally at ~/.config/launchknife/config.json. The active config location is shown in Settings → General, so it can also live in a dotfiles repository or behind a symlink.

{
  "version": 1,
  "snippets": [
    {
      "trigger": "!add",
      "description": "Mailing address",
      "replace": "123 Main St, Lisbon, Portugal"
    }
  ]
}

Insert today’s date

Use a date template inside {{date:…}}. It is rendered when the snippet is used, so the same entry always stays current.

{{date:%Y-%m-%d}}2026-07-15

{{date:%d-%m-%Y}}15-07-2026

{{date:%b %-d}}Jul 15

Formatting follows Chrono’s strftime-style date format. A dynamic snippet is labelled in the launcher preview before you paste it.

Included examples

@@ — Email address
!td — Today’s date, DD-MM-YYYY
!ty — Today’s date, YYYY-MM-DD
!day — Today’s date in a short form
!add — Mailing address