How I'm Using Variable Queries

My new favourite feature in Capacities!

Author

Beth McClelland
July 28th, 2025

I use queries every single day, so any update to them is super exciting. We've just released a huge one: variable queries.

These queries are aware of the note they're in, and they can use information from that note to dynamically update the query. For example, show all books written by "this” author. It means you get to use one query in several places, and get different results. It's so cool.

I wanted to show you some of the ways I'm using them so far.

Click to what’s interesting for your practices!

Reviewing

Capacities is both my research space and my personal space. I have shared my "LifeOS" set up in previous videos, but I've developed it further now with variable queries (and the default templates we also just launched...)

Weekly Review

I've put screenshots of each query set-up at the end of this post

I've now added a (default) template to bring some queries together to centralise the information that I need to fill out the properties. All these queries use the date range of whatever Week object I'm in.

For example…

I look at the queries, then choose an object from the results to write into my Week properties. 👇

The fourth query in this template is "looking back". I have brought most of my old weekly reviews into Capacities, this query resurfaces this week from each year into one view.

For this to work, I add a week number (via AI autofill) to each Week object. This means the query can just be set up to look for this week's number. It automatically updates depending on which week object I’m in.

Meta-reviews

I also do a secondary type of weekly review which I just call "metas". I write about this here, but essentially I go through the 'Created on this day' section of the Capacities calendar and weave everything I've collected into a narrative about what I'm interested in and why. In doing so I get to write and learn about my interests, where they came from, where I want them to go with them etc. It's really fun.

The calendar-first approach means it's an exhaustive review, I literally write about everything I create in a week, but I specifically wanted to capture the tags I create each week. These tags are a direct correlation into new topics I'm interested in. So I made a variable query for this.

It uses the date range from the meta object, and inserts that into the query.

Books authors have written

I realise I'm reading more and more by the same authors, so I've started adding them to my space, which I haven't historically done.

Whilst I have a two-way linked property (Related Media <-> People), I specifically wanted a query to give me a customisable view that includes the book covers, so I created a simple query. I order them by the order I read them.

I made this into a template called' author', so I can press Cmd U -> author and load this template (with the query) right away.

Side note

If you've been using two-way properties, then you technically get the same information here as you can see in the screenshot. Queries give you further filtering and sorting powers, and different view options.

So the question I asked myself when starting this was do I want to be able to filter/sort further or change the view? Yes -> Variable query + two-way linked property, No -> only two-way linked property

History Fun

Capacities handles dates really well, which makes history notes totally delightful. I have been waiting a long time to be able to do some of what I'll show below, so it's very exciting!

Events during the lifetimes of historical figures

I think it's important and interesting to know what events occurred during someone's lifetime, as context for things in their lifetime. So I created a query called "during their reign" (given I've used it for monarchs so far). It looks at my "In power" date range and automatically inserts that into the query, to look for events whose dates are within that range. I order the events by the date.

I've put this query into a 'historic ruler' template for easy access.

Years

I have a similar approach for Years. I have three queries: ~ eras ~ (what was going on in the background), "in power" and "events this year". I've arranged them into two columns. This is my default template.

Capacities’ Calendar is great for the day-to-day time dimension of your notes (capturing content, action plans etc), but my Year object type with these queries is how I get the "zoomed out" view you need when studying history.

Conclusion

That’s a snapshot at some of the ways I’m using variable queries right now. They’re really powerful and easy to use (and re-use!) so I’m sure I’ll find more use-cases too. If you’re interested in more use-cases please let me know 🙂 

Reference: Query Set Ups

These work because I have a date range property in my ‘Week’ object type. To recreate the queries below, please ensure you have this date range first.

This Week

This week’s quotes

This week’s sources

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