org-mode file+function capture template example

init-org.el

;; I am not a regular emacs user and haven't played with lisp for many years.
;; I struggled for a couple of days trying to tweak org-capture-templates to 
;; get my desired behavior for journal entries. I hope this helps someone!
;;
;; I have been following the excellent guide http://doc.norang.ca/org-mode.html
;; The "journal" template was the one I wanted to tweak. I use a date-based 
;; journal filename, e.g. "2015-09-22-Journal-Entry.org". The contents of the
;; file consist of a top-level headline with a human-friendly date, followed
;; by second-level headline with the time and brief journal note. For example:
;;
;;     * Tuesday, 22 September, 2015 :tag1:tag2:
;;     ** 03:39:39 PM EDT - Published my journal capture template to github
;;
;; I first tried:
;;
;;     ("j" "Journal" entry (file+headline (format-time-string *my-journal-file-format*) (format-time-string *my-journal-headline-format**)
;;      "** %<%H:%M:%S %p %Z> - %?\n" :clock-in t :clock-resume t)
;;
;; But org complained that the headline wasn't a stringp... So I thought that
;; file+function might work better for me. The org-mode docs don't explain what
;; "function" should do (does it take args? should there be a return value?).
;; Searching around online I did not find many examples which were useful. I 
;; looked at the source for the functionality that file+headline and file+datetree
;; use and eventually came up with the following.

(require 'org)

(defconst *my-org-dir* "~/Documents/personal-org")
(defconst *my-journal-file-format* (concat *my-org-dir* "/journal/%Y/%m/%d/%Y-%m-%d-Journal-Entry.org"))
(defconst *my-journal-headline-format* "%A, %d %B, %Y :tag1:tag2:")

;; Code based mostly on file+headline part of org-capture-set-target-location
;; Look for a headline that matches whatever *my-journal-headline-format* is
;; If it's not there insert it; otherwise position the cursor at the end of the
;; subtree.
(defun jww/find-journal-tree ()
  "Find or create my default journal tree"
  (setq hd (format-time-string *my-journal-headline-format*))
  (goto-char (point-min))
  (unless (derived-mode-p 'org-mode)
    (error
     "Target buffer \"%s\" for jww/find-journal-tree should be in Org mode"
     (current-buffer)))
  (if (re-search-forward
       (format org-complex-heading-regexp-format (regexp-quote hd))
       nil t)
      (goto-char (point-at-bol))
    (goto-char (point-min))
    (or (bolp) (insert "\n"))
    (insert "* " hd "\n")
    (beginning-of-line 0))
  (org-end-of-subtree))

;; note the use of "plain" instead of "entry"; using "entry" made this a top-level
;; headline regardless of how many * I put in the template string (wtf?).
(setq org-capture-templates
      (quote (("j" "Journal" plain (file+function (format-time-string *my-journal-file-format*) jww/find-journal-tree)
               "** %<%H:%M:%S %p %Z> - %?\n" :clock-in t :clock-resume t))))

(provide 'init-org)

Thanks! The "entry" top-level headline behavior was tripping me up, your comment helped immensely!

Thank you