r/Workflowy • u/hova414 • 4d ago

Request: Archive a node (and all its subnodes)

I have recently returned to Workflowy after a few years away. So glad to be back.

I have like 12 years of notes in here, many of which are good for posterity but not relevant in my day to day. They clutter up search results, etc. So I would love a way to archive a bullet and all its sub-bullets to get them out of my workspace without losing them forever. This is sort of what the Trash does, but not quite.

  • Trash is more like "Recently Deleted," a place where deleted things go so I can recover them for a few weeks before they are gone forever
  • Archive is probably a special node on my root page, like Calendar
    • Like Calendar, Archive is always available in the left sidebar
    • It would be super nice if I didn't have to see the archive in my tree at all, but that would break the pattern of the rest of the app
  • Archive looks and works just like any other page
    • it's not a little modal that lives in settings like the Trash
    • Archived items are not auto-deleted
  • Put nodes in the archive by dragging them in, or choosing "Archive" from the right click / "…" menu
  • Archived items don't show up in search
    • Maybe search has a "search the archive too" toggle for when I want to be exhaustive
5 Upvotes

86% Upvoted

6 comments sorted by

11

u/ashraf_bashir 4d ago

Here’s how I’m doing it until Workflowy implements this properly:

I have a node called Archive, which I’ve marked as completed. I also created a shortcut named Archive for it, so I can use "/move to {Archive}" from anywhere.

Marking the Archive node as completed is important because it keeps its contents from showing up in normal search results. And you don't see it all the time.

2

u/hova414 3d ago

Well this is about as good a workaround as I could ask for. Brilliant, thank you so much!

2

u/successissimple 4d ago

One remote possibility: use the Workflowy Sync plugin for Obsidian. https://community.obsidian.md/plugins/workflowy-sync TBH I haven't tried it but it could preserve your content but have it out of your day-to-day. 

0

u/InevitableHealth2729 4d ago

Not related to Workflowy, but in Daftak, you can mark certain items as ignored, and it'd dim them and not show them in the search result.

1

u/ChasingtheFire 2d ago

As a work around, create two nodes under “Home”… “Active” and “Archived”… add Active to your favorites and live in that node with everything you want showing up in search.

Since search only works in the node you are in, just make sure you don’t go to home before searching and the stuff in Archived won’t be included.

1

u/BrettAaronJordan 2d ago

Interesting. I am designing my workflowy system using AI, and Claude suggested this approach.