Edit files, skills and attachments

Notes in Files, the skills that teach Cheqq how you work, and the Markdown files attached to your records all open in the same editor. You write in blocks, the way you would in a document, and the file is saved as Markdown, exactly as it was apart from the paragraphs you changed.

Open a file

The editor opens full screen over the page you're on, with the same header as an artifact: the file's name, Save, Export and Close. Close it with Close, Esc or your browser's Back, and you're right where you were.

Select the file's name for its menu: Version history, Reload, Show in Files (or All skills for a skill), and Delete file or Delete skill when it's yours to delete.

• A file in Files. Select any .md, .markdown or .txt file.
• One of your skills. Settings → Skills, then the pen beside the skill. New Skill starts one from scratch.
• A Wapp's skill. On the Wapp's Skills tab, select the pen beside it.
• An attachment on a record. Open the record, select the attachment, then Open in editor.
• From chat. Select a file Cheqq links to, or the card it shows after opening a file for you.

Chat about a file

On a file in Files, Chat in the header starts a new conversation with the file attached. Nothing is sent until you write your message, so ask what you like: summarise it, turn it into a checklist, draft a reply from it.

Write in blocks

Each paragraph, heading, list, quote, table and code block is a block.

• Type / to pick a block: a heading, a bulleted, numbered or to-do list, a quote, code, a divider, a table or an image. Keep typing to narrow the list, and press Enter to insert.
• Point at a block to see + and a handle beside it. + adds a block below (hold Alt to add it above). Drag the handle to move the block, or select it for the block menu: Turn into, Duplicate, Move up, Move down and Delete.
• Cmd/Ctrl+/ opens the same menu for the block you're typing in, so you never need the mouse. Cmd/Ctrl+D duplicates a block and Alt+Shift+↑/↓ moves it.
• Markdown as you type. # and a space starts a heading, - a bulleted list, 1. a numbered one, [] a to-do, > a quote, three backticks a code block and --- a divider. **words** turns bold.

Format words

Select words and a toolbar appears above them: Bold, Italic, Strikethrough, Code and Link. Each has its key, shown when you point at it (Cmd/Ctrl+B, I, E, K). From the keyboard, Alt+F10 moves into the toolbar and Esc takes you back to the text.

Tables and images

Insert a table from /. Point at a column and a small handle appears above it; point at a row and one appears on its left. Click a handle for that column's or row's options, or drag it to move the column or row. The thin + bars along the table's right and bottom edges add a column or a row. Right-click any cell for everything at once: insert or move rows and columns, sort by the column (the header row stays on top), align the column, turn the header row on or off, and delete a row, a column or the whole table.

A table with many columns stretches past the text and scrolls sideways instead of squeezing its words. Tab moves to the next cell, and Tab in the last cell adds a row. From the keyboard, Alt+F10 in a table moves to its column handle: ← and → pick another column, Alt+← and Alt+→ move it, Enter opens its options and Esc goes back to the cell.

Markdown keeps a table's words and how each column is aligned, so a file offers those. Cell colours and column widths are for Cheqq documents.

An image in a file is a link to a picture: choose Image from / and paste its address, with a few words that describe it.

Some things only make sense in a Cheqq document, so a file doesn't offer them: callouts, toggles, colours, comments and asking Cheqq in the page. Everything a Markdown file can hold is kept: deeper headings, footnotes, links to other files, and any HTML the file already has.

Save

Select Save or press Cmd/Ctrl+S. Closing with changes you haven't saved asks whether to save them, discard them, or keep editing.

Only the paragraphs you changed are written. Everything else in the file stays exactly as it was, down to its spacing and the way its lists and bold are written, and a file you open and close without changing is never saved at all. If the file starts with settings between --- lines, they're kept as they are too.

While you work, Cheqq keeps a copy in the file's history a few seconds after you stop typing, so nothing is lost if you close the tab. The file itself changes only when you save.

Edit a skill

A skill's name and description sit above its text, as two fields, so you never edit them as raw text. The name is set when you create the skill and can't change after that; the description can. If a skill can't be saved, the editor says why, for example a description that's missing.

Get back an earlier version

Choose Version history from the file's menu. It opens beside the file (as a sheet on a phone), with every version listed by who saved it and when, newest first.

• Compare with current shows what changed: added words underlined, removed words struck through.
• Restore puts that version back in the editor and saves it. The restore is a version of its own, so you can undo it the same way.

Documents and files share this history, so it works the same everywhere.

If the file changed since you opened it

If someone else, or one of your automations, saves the file while you have it open, your save stops and says This file changed since you opened it.

• Reload shows you their version, and leaves out your unsaved changes.
• Keep mine saves your version over theirs. Their change stays in the file's history if you need it back.

When a file opens read-only

You can read the file but not change it, and the editor says why:

• the file is larger than 1 MB;
• you can view the workspace, or the Wapp, but not edit it;
• the skill came with Cheqq or with a Wapp from the Store, rather than one you uploaded or wrote;
• you're looking at a shared copy;
• the attachment belongs to an artifact. Edit it in Artifacts instead.

Download a file

Select Export, then the download button beside Markdown. You get the file exactly as it is in the editor, unsaved edits included; the row says Includes your unsaved changes. when there are some. A skill downloads as SKILL.md, with its name and description at the top, ready to use elsewhere. Read-only files download the same way.

Make a document from a file

When people should comment on a note or an attachment, or write in it with you, make it a document. On a file in Files or a record's attachment, select Export: the card at the top says Want people to comment and edit? Select Make a document (or Save and make a document when you have unsaved changes). The document is a copy, so editing it won't change the file. Skills can't be made into documents. See Write documents together.