Categories
Emacs GNU/Linux Free Software & Open Source

MobileOrg for Android setup and workflow

MobileOrg

Here’s a quick post on how I setup MobileOrg for Android

First of all, get the MobileOrg app from the Google Play Store. In my case, I set it up to work with my Dropbox account. The setup wizard is very simple and really the confusion or configuration relies on the desktop side with your Emacs setup.

According to the Org mode manual about MobileOrg, you have to setup the following:

You need to tell orgmode where all your org files will be stored. In my case I put them inside a ‘org/’ in my home directory.

;; Org mode
(setq org-directory "~/org")

Then you need to configure this two OrgMobile settings. The first variable “org-mobile-directory” must point to your local dropbox folder, the same path you indicated on your mobile device when configuring the app. The second one is the index file that MobileOrg will use to keep track of changes and other temporary stuff. I put it inside my org-directory for simplicity.

;; MobileOrg
(setq org-mobile-directory "~/Dropbox/MobileOrg")
(setq org-mobile-inbox-for-pull (concat org-directory "/index.org"))

Make sure the index.org file you indicated exists, if not create an empty file in that path.

Workflow

Now comes the simple part on how to work with it. All you have to do to make your org files available to the app is to run:

M-x org-mobile-push


On the app, just push the synchronize button each time you make any changes so they can be pulled on the desktop side with:

M-x org-mobile-pull

And that's it! Very simple and useful. I still think the MobileOrg app needs a lot of UI improvements but it's nice to have you org notes available at anytime and easy to edit without using only a text editor on a mobile device.

By Gabriel Saldaña

Gabriel Saldaña is a web developer, photographer and free software advocate. Connect with him on and Twitter