Filepad has three reference triggers. They exist so a person and an agent reading the same sentence resolve it to the same object — not to a title that happens to match.
| Trigger | What it references | Canonical text form |
|---|---|---|
@ | A specific artifact, file, or folder | @artifact:Q3 Report, @/Reports/Q3 |
# | A tag (a group you define) | #finance, #clients/acme |
[[ ]] | An artifact by title | [[Q3 Report]] |
When you pick an item from the popup, Filepad stores a chip that holds the target's identity — not just its text. Rename the target later and the reference still points at the right thing.
@ — reference a specific thing
Type @ and keep typing to filter. The popup searches artifacts, files, and folders in the current workspace.
Pick from the popup rather than typing the full reference by hand. Picking stores the target's identity; typing plain text is just text until it's parsed.
@ can resolve to a range of target kinds, including artifacts, artifact versions, folders, file nodes, sheets, uploads, findings, workflows, workflow runs, agent runs, contacts, companies, and emails.
# — tag things
A tag is a label you define and attach to objects, so you can refer to a whole group at once.
Tag slugs are lowercase, and may contain letters, digits, -, _, and /. They must start with a letter or digit. The / lets you nest: clients/acme and clients/globex sit under clients.
When you type a tag name that doesn't exist yet, Filepad normalizes it for you — trims it, strips a leading #, replaces spaces with -, collapses repeated /, and lowercases the result. So Client Notes becomes client-notes.
Creating and assigning tags
Open the Related items panel beside an artifact and type into the Add a tag… field. If the tag doesn't exist, Filepad creates it and assigns it in one step. There's no separate "create tag first" flow.
Tags can be archived and restored rather than only deleted, so a retired grouping keeps its history.
[[ ]] — cross-reference by title
Type [[ to search artifacts by title. This is the familiar wiki-link form, and it's useful in prose where @artifact:Q3 Report would read awkwardly mid-sentence.
[[Q3 Report]] and @artifact:Q3 Report resolve to the same artifact — [[ ]] is a matter of reading comfort, not a different capability.
Where each trigger works
This is the part worth knowing, because the surfaces differ.
All three triggers (@, #, [[) work in:
- The FilepadAI chat composer
- Workflow manual-run reference inputs
- Workflow expression and target fields in the builder inspector
Only @ is wired as a live popup in:
- The note editor
- The document editor
In notes and documents, # and [[ typed as plain text are still recognized and rendered as chips when the content is parsed — they just don't open a picker as you type. To reference a tag inside a document today, type the canonical form (#finance) directly.
Why chips instead of plain text
A chip stores four things: the trigger, the target kind, the target ID, and a display label. When Filepad converts a chip back to text it regenerates the canonical form from those stored attributes rather than re-parsing the visible text.
The practical consequence: references survive round-trips. Text you write, an agent rewrites, and you edit again still resolves to the same objects.
Related items
The Related items panel next to an artifact shows what it's connected to and lets you manage its tags. Relations are first-class — an artifact can be linked to other objects, not only tagged.
Next steps
- Writing in Filepad — the editors, slash commands, and formatting
- Core concepts — workspaces, artifacts, and the object model