# Where are templates defined **URL:** \ **Category:** Troubleshooting\ **Created:** [May 6, 2020, 10:51pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76 "2020-05-06T22:51:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![edumerco](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/edumerco/32/52_2.png) [@edumerco](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/edumerco)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2020, 10:51pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/1 "2020-05-06T22:51:38Z")
Dear all. Sorry if it’s obvious to all of you, but I’m new to this and even after reading all the documentation that I could find (both the local info file and the site in readthedocs) it took me quite a while to find where/how is the template specified (not the way to define it, but how or where to do it). After some searching appeared `setq org-roam-capture-templates` and voilá! 🤯 Do you believe it could be useful for other new users like me to specify that in the documentation in [https://org-roam.readthedocs.io/en/latest/templating/](https://org-roam.readthedocs.io/en/latest/templating/), where the example is, or maybe surrounding it? Thanks a lot for your kind attention… 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![zaeph](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/zaeph/32/764_2.png) [@zaeph](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/zaeph)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2020, 11:06pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/2 "2020-05-06T23:06:39Z")
Hi. You’re right, we’re not mentioning the name of the variable in the doc. We’re not as diligent at maintaining the external doc as we are with the internal documentantion, i.e., the one you can access directly from Emacs (try pressing `C-h v` and C-h f` to look up variables and functions respectively). We’re currently planning an overhaul of the manual, hopefully in a way that would allow us to maintain a single file which would output to many different format, both internal to Emacs (e.g. info-pages) and external (e.g. the [readthedocs.io](http://readthedocs.io) manual). In the meantime, if you know how to use git, you could submit a PR on the GitHub tracker to mention the name of the variable, and help users which would potentially find themselves in the same spot. ---
**Author:** ![edumerco](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/edumerco/32/52_2.png) [@edumerco](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/edumerco)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2020, 11:16pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/3 "2020-05-06T23:16:49Z")
Your diligence is not at stake at all. 😃 Eventually I found it in the internal documentation, but I don’t know how many people uses it. I just learned it a couple days ago. The one source, many outputs is certainly great to reduce effort and increase coherency. What format are you evaluating? Org is one of them, I assume… 😉 Maybe I can help giving it a read… I will create a PR to leave it mentioned. ---
**Author:** ![edumerco](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/edumerco/32/52_2.png) [@edumerco](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/edumerco)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2020, 11:28pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/4 "2020-05-06T23:28:49Z")
Done in [https://github.com/jethrokuan/org-roam/issues/573](https://github.com/jethrokuan/org-roam/issues/573). I’m not a Github frequent user so please forgive me if this is not the place or way. In that case, just point me to where should it be and I’ll happily move or re-create it. ---
**Author:** ![jethro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5a626/32.png) [@jethro](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/jethro)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2020, 5:35am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/5 "2020-05-07T05:35:33Z")
You did good here, thanks for pointing it out! ---
**Author:** ![Drudge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a4c791/32.png) [@Drudge](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/Drudge)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2020, 5:57am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/6 "2020-05-07T05:57:06Z")
Thanks for this…I am/was also stuck with the templates. (new to emacs) ---
**Author:** ![sustainednz](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/sustainednz/32/15_2.png) [@sustainednz](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/sustainednz)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2020, 10:38pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/7 "2020-05-07T22:38:26Z")
Hi there, while I’m not an elisp gun, I’d like to contribute to the org-roam initiative. If you are planning a manual overhaul, maybe I could help with this? ---
**Author:** ![jethro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5a626/32.png) [@jethro](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/jethro)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 7:05am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/8 "2020-05-08T07:05:04Z")
Hi @sustainednz, we are planning a manual overhaul. We have centralized all the docs in [https://github.com/jethrokuan/org-roam/blob/master/doc/org-roam.org](https://github.com/jethrokuan/org-roam/blob/master/doc/org-roam.org), which we intend to use to generate HTML for online docs, as well as Info docs so they can be accessed from within Emacs. The manual needs to be more comprehensive, and probably needs some reorganization. Each of the individual components (corresponding to their files) needs a subsection. I think we’re missing one for the daily notes functionality, at the very least. Either way, an extra pair of eyes on it would be helpful. ---
**Author:** ![edumerco](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/edumerco/32/52_2.png) [@edumerco](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/edumerco)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 3:55pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/9 "2020-05-08T15:55:20Z")
I’ll help with that reading and suggestions. 🙂 If I need some help with git, is anyone in this community that can give me a couple minutes? Just if I have problems or got stuck… (just a PM is ok, no need to reply here). I’m not a coder, work on UX and sustainability. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![zaeph](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/zaeph/32/764_2.png) [@zaeph](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/zaeph)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 4:05pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/10 "2020-05-08T16:05:39Z")
> [@edumerco](#): > > If I need some help with git, is anyone in this community that can give me a couple minutes? Just if I have problems or got stuck… (just a PM is ok, no need to reply here). I’m not a coder, work on UX and sustainability. [This book](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2) is a pretty good resource for git. If you follow the section, you should get a solid understanding of what’s at stake. If you have further question, you can find me on Slack. ---
**Author:** ![edumerco](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/edumerco/32/52_2.png) [@edumerco](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/edumerco)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 4:09pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/11 "2020-05-08T16:09:21Z")
Thanks a lot… 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![zaeph](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/zaeph/32/764_2.png) [@zaeph](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/zaeph)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2020, 4:10pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/12 "2020-05-08T16:10:33Z")
I’ve created the channel **#git** on Slack to centralise those questions. Feel free to join whenever you have a question. ---
**Author:** ![sustainednz](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/sustainednz/32/15_2.png) [@sustainednz](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/sustainednz)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2020, 6:29am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/13 "2020-05-09T06:29:04Z")
Cool, I can definitely help with document structure and content. Did you have a process in mind, or should I review/revise and submit for review (through git)? ---
**Author:** ![sustainednz](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/org-roam.discourse.group/sustainednz/32/15_2.png) [@sustainednz](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/sustainednz)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2020, 7:09am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/14 "2020-05-09T07:09:00Z")
At this point, I’m thinking I should fork the repo, create a new branch for documentation revisions, and go from there, but am open to other alternatives if you have a suggestion/recommendation/preference? ---
**Author:** ![jethro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5a626/32.png) [@jethro](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/jethro)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2020, 10:15am UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/15 "2020-05-09T10:15:49Z")
@sustainednz yes, forking the repo and making a pull request would be the regular approach to contributing back. Let me know if you need help with that workflow. ---
**Author:** ![das](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/46a35a/32.png) [@das](https://org-roam.discourse.group/u/das)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2020, 9:05pm UTC](https://org-roam.discourse.group/t/where-are-templates-defined/76/16 "2020-07-04T21:05:54Z")
May I make a suggestion - looking at today’s [org-roam.org](http://org-roam.org), I see: - The Org-roam buffer displays backlinks for the currently active Org-roam note. - User Option: org-roam-buffer The name of the org-roam buffer. Defaults to _org-roam_. - User Option: org-roam-buffer-position The position of the Org-roam buffer side window. Valid values are =’left=, =’right=, =’top=, =’bottom=. May I suggest that a sample init.el or config.el entry be included for each of these sections? Just now, adding: (setq org-roam-buffer “backlinks”) which didn’t throw and error but made no difference in the label of the org-roam buffer window (which, by the way, seems to default to “roam”, not “org-roam”). I’m sure to be doing something wrong, but up to now I’ve been happy with org and org-journal “out of the box” and may just not understand what I should have done. BTW, I’m a “Vanilla EMACS” user and would prefer to have examples for non-Doom users, but I’m willing to accept being a minority, if that’s the case.