Templates

Templates are reusable markdown files with pre-defined frontmatter schemas. They ensure consistency when creating decisions, handoffs, daily notes, and other structured documents.

Built-in Templates

ClawVault ships with these templates:

CLI Commands

template list

List all available templates (built-in and custom).

clawvault template list

template create

Create a new file from a template.

# Create a decision record
clawvault template create decision --title "Use Postgres over MongoDB"

# Create a daily note
clawvault template create daily-note --title "2026-02-15"

# Create a person profile
clawvault template create person --title "Justin Dukes"

template add

Add a custom template from an existing file.

clawvault template add ~/my-templates/standup.md

Creating Custom Templates

Custom templates are markdown files stored in templates/ in your vault. Any markdown file in that folder becomes available via template create.

Example: Standup template

Create templates/standup.md:

---
title: "Standup — {{date}}"
type: standup
created: {{timestamp}}
---

## Yesterday
-

## Today
-

## Blockers
-

Then use it:

clawvault template create standup --title "Standup — 2026-02-15"

Example: Meeting notes template

Create templates/meeting.md:

---
title: "{{title}}"
type: meeting
attendees: []
created: {{timestamp}}
---

## Agenda
-

## Notes
-

## Action Items
-

## Decisions
-

Best Practices

• Use templates for recurring documents — if you create the same structure more than twice, make it a template
• Keep frontmatter consistent — templates enforce schema consistency across documents of the same type
• Version your templates — they live in your vault, so they're version-controlled with git