How can I reference a section by number in org-mode export?

Question

I\'m working in org-mode and trying to generate a link to reference a section by its number, not its title.

* Section One
:PROPERTIES:
:CUSTOM_ID: sec:one
:END:
         


        

Answer 1

You can refer to sections by name:

* Section One

* Section Two

* Links
  This is a number link: [[Section One]]
  This is a textual link: [[Section One][Some text for the link]]

Here's the LaTeX output:

\section{Section One}
\label{sec:orgheadline1}

\section{Section Two}
\label{sec:orgheadline2}

\section{Links}
\label{sec:orgheadline3}
This is a number link: \ref{sec:orgheadline1}
This is a textual link: \hyperref[sec:orgheadline1]{Some text for the link}

Answer 2

I use dedicated targets for this:

* Section One
  <<sec:one>>

* Section Two
  <<sec:two>>

I can reference Section One with  [[sec:one]] and [[sec:one][Section One]],
but I can get the actual section number (1) to resolve.

This works as expected; see the orgmode documentation on internal links for reference.

Answer 3

Tom Regner's approach works, however, you don't have to use dedicated target, you can still use custom_id link, but without a description. Like this:

* Section One
:PROPERTIES:
:CUSTOM_ID: sec:one
:END:

* Section Two
You can reference Section One with [[#sec:one]] but NOT
[[#sec:one][Section One]], i.e., the link without description
will get you the actual section number (1).