Obsidian is a note-taking app that shops all the pieces in plain textual content paperwork in your laptop—however that is only the start. There are extraordinarily quick search and keyboard shortcuts, plus you possibly can hyperlink to any of your notes from every other notice. Not everybody will get into it, granted, however in case you do, it modifications the best way you concentrate on writing and note-taking.
However the place issues get actually wild are the plugins. There are over 1,600 of them, all lovingly made by different customers, which you’ll be able to browse and set up within the settings. I could not start to let you know that are the very best ones—that is going to closely depend upon what you are in search of from the appliance. However I can let you know that with these plugins, you possibly can flip Obsidian into just about precisely the software you are in search of. The next are the plugins I believe new customers ought to take a look at first, if solely to get an thought of what plugins can do.
I am together with hyperlinks to the Github web page for all of those plugins, principally for reference. It is a terrific deal simpler to put in plugins from inside Obsidian than it’s to put in them manually: Simply go to Settings > Neighborhood Plugins > Browse and discover the plugins there.
Arrange something with Kanban
Credit score: Justin Pot
We have talked a number of instances about the Kanban methodology, which includes a sequence of columns you possibly can drag playing cards between. There are many devoted apps for this, most famously Trello, however there is a catch: It’s important to keep in mind to open them. For this reason I just like the Kanban plugin for Obsidian. With this, I can create Kanban boards proper in Obsidian. Each board is only a textual content doc with a number of lists, which means they do not take up quite a lot of area, and you’ll even edit them straight as textual content paperwork in order for you.
That is only a nice implementation of a useful gizmo—one which lives proper alongside your different notes. I take advantage of this to prepare my complete writing workflow, from brainstorming to writing to modifying to invoicing. I can not advocate it sufficient.
Ignore markdown with this toolbar
Credit score: Justin Pot
Obsidian is constructed round Markdown, a easy method of formatting textual content recordsdata. I, personally, love this: It is a quicker method so as to add easy formatting to paperwork. It isn’t for everybody, nonetheless, which is the place Enhancing toolbar is available in. This straightforward extension provides a formatting toolbar to the highest of each textual content window with frequent formatting choices. The whole lot remains to be formatted utilizing Markdown, however you possibly can apply that formatting with the clicking of a mouse button if that is your choice. For some, that is only a approach to do formatting duties till you be taught to make use of Markdown; for others, it may be a substitute for studying Markdown totally. There isn’t any improper solutions right here.
Copy notes to different apps full with formatting
Credit score: Justin Pot
Talking of formatting: Typically you are going to need to copy textual content from Obsidian and paste it in one other app. If the app in query would not help Markdown, that is going to be togch. For this reason I take advantage of Copy as HTML: With this plugin, you possibly can copy and paste with all of the formatting in tact. You possibly can set off this from the command palette, in case you like, or you possibly can add a customized keyboard shortcut. I take advantage of this to repeat textual content and paste it into Google Docs, Microsoft Phrase, and even the Lifehacker CMS—it really works completely each time.
Shortly seize the contents of any web site
Grabbing articles from the net and marking them up is a necessary a part of many analysis workflows. I take advantage of the Extract URL extension for this. Just like reader mode in browsers, this software can seize the article—and solely the article—of any URL you present to it. My favourite method to make use of it’s with the “Import From Clipboard” command, which you could find within the command palette or by assigning a keyboard shortcut. Simply copy a URL, run the command, and the complete article from the URL can be copied to the present notice. You could possibly use this to make your personal learn it later service, in case you wished to.
Evaluation your journal day by day
Credit score: Justin Pot
We have talked about how nice it’s to use Obsidian as a journalling app. The Journal overview makes this course of even higher. With it, you possibly can arrange the sidebar to indicate you entries from no matter time frame you want. I, personally, wish to see entries from one, two, three, 4, and 5 years in the past, although I will inevitably regulate this as I’ve an increasing number of years of journal entries. I am actually having fun with seeing what previous variations of me had been occupied with—it is educating me so much in regards to the methods through which I’m, and am not, rising. This plugin makes that doable.
