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Show HN: Obsidian Canvas – An infinite space for your ideas

• jaimex2 4y ago
  Is it strange that they made a whole bunch of thick clients for what should have been a browser based product? Least they made a Linux client, good on em. Edit. Read more, I get the clients now. Wow. Its so rare to see products think about not locking in.
  • kepano 4y ago
    Obsidian is designed to work offline using local files on your device, and us optimized for E2E encryption which so it would be more complicated to do as a web-based app.
• mknapper1 4y ago
  This looks like Obsidian's first move away from using some dialect of markdown? The .canvas files appear to be human readable json, but certainly not as readable as markdown. I'm excited to try this out, but I hope this isn't a trend towards using proprietary formats.
  • seanw444 4y ago
    Or even harder-to-parse open formats. Doesn't have to be proprietary to be a pain.
  • rchaud 4y ago
    The linked documents are still Markdown. If I understand it correctly, the use case is to link existing MD notes visually. That's a different way of looking at the data than the two-way backlink approach that was the foundation of Obsidian (and other personal wiki tools). I'm interested in this, as I currently use a combination of Obsidian + SimpleMind, but currently SimpleMind has more features (full fledged mindmapping app), and I like having two separate spaces to sketch out ideas.
    • steveylang 4y ago
      I also use both, Simplemind is a fantastic mind mapping app. For smaller scale mindmapping though, I am finding Canvas very usable already for such an early release. The ability to easily link or embed to markdown files (or create new ones) is really nice, and I like having all my work in a common area. Community created plugins will also dramatically expand the app. There will always be advantages for the dedicated apps as well, but this is going to be a great option for many.
  • chrisdhal 4y ago
    And there's nothing saying you have to use it, this doesn't remove the regular notes.
  • kepano 4y ago
    The .canvas files are a JSON-based file format that we open-sourced under MIT license. Just like everything else in Obsidian, it's still all local files on your device. You can see the spec for .canvas here: https://github.com/obsidianmd/obsidian-api/blob/master/canvas.d.ts https://github.com/obsidianmd/obsidian-api/blob/master/canva...
  • ericax 4y ago
    We considered many options to use Markdown but came to the conclusion that Canvas is not something that can fit into a readable Markdown file. Either the Markdown file would so messy that it becomes pointless (i.e. you would never open it in Typora to edit), or it would severely limit the power of Canvas. After much internal debate we chose the JSON format. We stay committed to keep it as open and easy to work with as possible. Plugin developers are already parsing and modifying the JSON file to programmatically change a Canvas view, and I think that's a fantastic start!
    • LunarAurora 4y ago
      IMO it is the best compromise. Now that you crossed that line, I hope the next "custom format" will be a "real" outliner. You are surely familiar with outliners ;-) It is about full block-level support really, and all what that allows (API, backlinks, query, aliases...) Anyway, Canvas Rocks! Thanks!
    • threesmegiste 4y ago
      Opportunity cost. I wrote on your forums about the decioson of using plain markdown. Consider other formats to stop bloating(yaml and dataview variables) markdown files. Now you have bloated md files and another format. Now i am saying you will add sqlite after one or two years. Waiting for extra file formats making existing files ugly. Also obsidian needs multi user vaults. Start to think what extra file format needed for this.
• MarcelOlsz 4y ago
  Can someone link a good Obsidian course?
  • wojciechpolak 4y ago
    A lot of interesting Obsidian videos both for beginners and more advanced users: https://www.youtube.com/@nicolevdh/videos https://www.youtube.com/@nicolevdh/videos
• tommica 4y ago
  Amazing! Great job
• reneberlin 4y ago
  I was searching for something like this a few months ago, when i saw an srtist creating endless zoomable-art by using "infinte canvas". But this polished solution tops any of my expectations. You've put so much effort in it - just wow! And perfectly presented. We owe you something for this!
• KnobbleMcKnees 4y ago
  This is like Notion meets FigJams. Pretty cool.
• whalesalad 4y ago
  I've been wanting a tool like this forever - ideally you can enter/exit these scopes/contexts so that everything above fades away. I like to think about problems in these scopes and then have the ability to "zoom out" to collect/link things, without disturbing the internal contents. Kinda like the C4/icepanel stuff but without so much pomp and circumstance.
  • pps 4y ago
    museapp.com works like that. Also heptabase.com and many others https://infinitecanvas.tools/ https://infinitecanvas.tools/
• egberts1 4y ago
  still no free search
  • 323 4y ago
    What do you mean? It seems to do free text search over notes content just fine for me.
    • egberts1 4y ago
      Obsidian iOS type in a paragraph in a doc, then hit search for a keyword. cricket
• brightball 4y ago
  That is fantastic! I've never been satisfied with Draw.io at a cross platform option for this after getting so comfortable with OmniGraffle in my OSX days. Can't wait to take this for a spin.
• robofanatic 4y ago
  How is this different from Figma? my only issue with Figma is navigating through the screens once you create this gigantic canvas.
  • weego 4y ago
    It's in a completely different product space, so there's that to differentiate them as a start.
    • dotBen 4y ago
      Are you familiar with FigJams?
      • ethanbond 4y ago
        Still very different. Obsidian Canvas is about spatially organizing your already-existing knowledge base in Obsidian. Figjam is more like virtual whiteboarding. Big big fan of both Obsidian and Figma/Figjam, they don't really compete here though.
  • 1123581321 4y ago
    They’re building up to these features from plain text. Similarly, right now they’re discussing how to contain a node-based database in human-readable markdown comments.
  • kepano 4y ago
    Obsidian is knowledge management tool, you can think of it like a personal wiki. So it gives you some different types of elements that you can place inside the Canvas, e.g. notes, PDFs, videos, audio, and even iframe web pages. For example you can embed embed Markdown notes inside a Canvas, and embed a Canvas inside a Markdown note.
• drawingthesun 4y ago
  A lot of notes apps seem to be adding some type of visual note-taking (is that the right term?) Logseq now has a whiteboard feature that is similarly powerful.
• angelmm 4y ago
  My new year resolution is to move from Notion to Obsidian. I found Notion unreliable in some situations and tbh, I'm not using the mobile application at all.
• mmastrac 4y ago
  I would kill for some sort of integration between Remarkable and Obsidian. Both are excellent tools and the Remarkable is great for sketching on the go. I just wish I could keep both in sync somehow.
  • sofixa 4y ago
    That's one of the reasons i went with an Onyx Boox tablet instead of a Remarkable - that way i have the Android Obsidian app, in sync, and i can sketch on it (with Excalidraw, i haven't tested Canvas yet).
    • dhc02 4y ago
      Onyx + obsidian is such a great combo
  • azeirah 4y ago
    I'm working on a sync tool specifically for ReMarkable to Obsidian. https://scrybble.ink https://scrybble.ink It's still in beta for now, so it's definitely not flawless, but it does work! You can choose which files from your tree to sync, they will appear as pdf files in your vault.
    • daviross 4y ago
      When this gets to reasonable stability, this may be enough to get me to buy ReMarkable just for it. It might be worth seeing if they have any sort of referral program. "Buy ReMarkable through me & get X months syncing free!" type deal.
      • azeirah 4y ago
        A dream would be first-party integration. Syncing from one to the other is one thing, but a first-party obsidian application running on the ReMarkable? I'd let ReMarkable hire me to make this happen if this is something they'd be interested in (I love my current job though!)
    • 4y ago
• raybb 4y ago
  One thing that's really missing for me from Obsidian is a view similar to that of Google Keep. Like sometimes I want to drop a small note "my stuff is in locker 2130" or "Look into Open Library <> WikiData linking percentage" and then easily be able to see it again in a few of all notes most recent. A thread on Reddit give me a small hope this update may do that but I don't think so. PS: I'm aware of the daily notes viewer, and that's what I currently use for most of these situations. But it doesn't help with having a simple way to see contents of all recently created notes. Edit: this is something I mostly want for mobile
  • ngrilly 4y ago
    I'm using both Obsidian and Apple Notes, both on my iPhone and MacBook, and that's also the main thing I'm missing in Obsidian and keeps me partly on Apple Notes: it's faster and easier to create a note in Apple Notes, retrieve it (as they as are sorted from most recent by default, and also I can pin some notes), search, and navigate in folders (especially on mobile, navigating across folders is so much better with Apple Notes than Obsidian). I'd really like to see Obsidian takes some inspiration from Apple Notes there and improve his. Otherwise, it is fantastic tool and it's really good to know that everything is stored locally in plain text.
    • rcarr 4y ago
      Preface: I am a massive Obsidian fan and use it everyday. The problem is they wanted it multi platform on iOS, Android, Mac, Windows and Linux so they made it using electron. Unless they either do native versions for each platform (5 apps!) or rewrite the entire application in something quicker like Tauri it’s never going to be as fast as apple notes, and will only get worse every time you add a new plugin.
      • dr_kiszonka 4y ago
        They could consider rewriting it in Flutter/Dart. My understanding is that Flutter is faster than Electron.
• Mockapapella 4y ago
  Just got the stupidest excited grin on my face from seeing this. Looking forward to trying it!
• poszlem 4y ago
  I honestly cannot grasp how is it possible for the Obsidian team to consistently release such high quality software on a regular basis, almost for free and with such a small team. Just incredible, and if anybody from Obsidian reads that, you have my utmost respect.
  • criddell 4y ago
    I kind of wish they would plant a stake in the ground and declare it feature complete and then go into maintenance mode. It's almost inevitable that they are going to keep adding features, give up control to VCs, and then fade away like Evernote. This feature is neat, but it feels like a turning point. I believe it's the first betrayal of the it's-just-a-folder-of-markdown-files principle.
    • unshavedyak 4y ago
      It's just a plugin i believe, you can choose to not use it. There are _many_ community plugins that go well beyond just-markdown, i don't feel this is any different. Remember, most of Obsidian is just plugins. Even core functionality. Which is a big reason i use Obsidian.
    • meltyness 4y ago
      You can represent a collection of nodes like that, but human readable/machine readable flow configuration, highlighting, plus composition seems like a tall ask, and JSON is a small extension that's mostly human-readable as it is. This is adhering to an obvious crack showing in Obsidian as it is: how do you store a graph view configuration? Right now, per vault, you get one slot unless you draw in something like Juggl, which is... well it raises serious usability concerns.
    • kepano 4y ago
      I agree that VC basically killed Evernote. Obsidian is completely user-supported, no investors, we're explicitly avoiding the VC route. As far as features go, we're continuing down the path of a modular architecture. The core will continue to be as streamlined as possible. Canvas is like any other plugin, you can disable it. We think that flexibility is important, because not everyone thinks the same way. You should be able to create an environment that fits your way of thinking. However not everyone needs every feature, thus the modularity/extensibility approach.
• evnix 4y ago
  I really wish the UI worked like excalidraw, the interface is seamless and something Obsidian could take ideas from. the end result could have been an SVG which makes it compatible with every other software out there.
  • ericax 4y ago
    Canvas is less of a piece of drawing software and more of brainstorm/mindmapping/idea workbench software. Excalidraw will satisfy different use case than Canvas and you can definitely use both!
    • qumpis 4y ago
      I was using Excalidraw for (maybe unconventional?) mind-mapping, and one feature that I learned to appreciate is the ability to introduce unstructured objects into the diagram (e.g. add a box grouping arbitrary links, drop an image etc). I wonder how Canvas will hold up for such use cases.
  • pps 4y ago
    You can use Excalidraw in Obsidian, there is a plugin that uses it and extends it in many ways.
  • niels_bom 4y ago
    I loved Excalidraw but I love tldraw even more. beta.tldraw.com. Also uses JSON as the data format btw.
• retSava 4y ago
  Looks like something I've looked for for a long time! Will def try it out. Can also recommend the excellent app Pureref, which is an infinite canvas for pictures. Does not compete with this though, different use cases. https://www.pureref.com https://www.pureref.com
• kwerk 4y ago
  Anyone have a video on this? I’m not quite getting it.
  • kuu 4y ago
    There are some videos on the site but it's taking time to load, I think the site is under HN hug.
  • kepano 4y ago
    Here are a couple short examples https://twitter.com/kepano/status/1601664161360261120 https://twitter.com/kepano/status/1601664161360261120 https://twitter.com/kepano/status/1601664161360261120 https://twitter.com/kepano/status/1601664161360261120 And some longer walkthrough videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLBd_ADeKIw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLBd_ADeKIw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3DJKk4ivq4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3DJKk4ivq4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPescoJzcFA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPescoJzcFA
  • ericax 4y ago
    We have a bunch of short clips that show how to do various things, not sure if they are helpful to you: https://obsidian.md/canvas#protips https://obsidian.md/canvas#protips
• kepano 4y ago
  Obsidian Canvas uses a new JSON-based file format that we have open-sourced under MIT license. You can see the spec here: https://github.com/obsidianmd/obsidian-api/blob/master/canvas.d.ts https://github.com/obsidianmd/obsidian-api/blob/master/canva... Just like all other files in Obsidian, canvas files are your own and local to your device. You're still linking to your own Markdown files which are just as future-proof as ever. We decided to create the .canvas format because there wasn't any pre-existing canvas-type format we could find that fit our priorities around longevity, readability, interoperability and extensibility. The .canvas format is designed to be as easy to parse as possible. We've already seen a few plugins take advantage of it, and we hope that more tools will become available that can use the .canvas format.
  • readerbaza 4y ago
    Why every electron app feels the need to reinvent the window border/title? Does this look OK? https://i.postimg.cc/4ymyHWxF/window-border.png https://i.postimg.cc/4ymyHWxF/window-border.png
  • cwilby 4y ago
    ~Can't wait to try this out~ just installed, thank you!
  • helloguillecl 4y ago
    Great! I love the philosophy around open and clear formats. Like I have said before, a second brain should be as open and reliable as possible.
    • imperfect_blue 4y ago
      Trello boards export to JSON, would you consider it open? OneNote notebooks are also an open and well-documented specification, as well as local first and backed by a very reliable company, which makes them just as open as Obsidian by those standards. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/office_file_formats/ms-one/73d22548-a613-4350-8c23-07d15576be50 https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/office_file_form...
• 2wrist 4y ago
  To the obsidian folks, thanks for adding this feature. It is definitely interesting. Will be exploring this further.
• jghn 4y ago
  With the caveat that I'm very far from a power user, I'm struggling to picture how I'd use this. Not as in I think it's a bad idea, but rather it looks cool but I believe I don't quite understand it. I think the following is an example of an intended use case? Can anyone confirm/deny? For my work related notes, there's some hierarchical structure to them even though it's hard to see that at the note level. There's all the projects for my work, and then for each project there are notes, and sometimes those notes have notes, etc. I think what Canvas would do here is let me create a visual board for all of the notes related to my work that'd make it easier for me to visualize the whole, drill in/out in particular areas, etc? Does that sound right?
  • burkaman 4y ago
    There are some examples at the bottom of the page. I think this biology taxonomy one is pretty cool: https://obsidian.md/images/canvas/canvas-lunaris13-full.png https://obsidian.md/images/canvas/canvas-lunaris13-full.png
    • jghn 4y ago
      Yeah I saw those. It's what made me think of my hierarchical structure for my work stuff. But not sure that I'm really understanding or just pattern matching to something similar but different.
      • SamBam 4y ago
        You won't necessarily find an example that matches your use-case. I wouldn't assume that this was made with a regular note-taker or GTD-style productivity person in mins. Not every tool needs to work for everyone. I think if your work already involves drawing flowcharts or diagrams of connected nodes, like in the biologist in the example, them it will make sense. If not, it will probably not be useful.
  • afterburner 4y ago
    I consider myself a very visual person, and yet I never find any of these very overtly visual organization-type tools even remotely appealing. It seems to me there's... too much friction and fiddliness for something I can visualize myself after looking at a text list or folder structure? I guess maybe it would help as a presentation tool to show others how you visualize a project. I just hope it's worth the effort. Maybe the others you show it to will be impressed?
• garganzol 4y ago
  One thing that bugs me with Obsidian: I cannot create a link to a specific obsidian vault on desktop (Windows). The thing is I often take small notes and opening an Obsidian (or any other app) is usually too much work for me. Instead, I prefer to create file shortcuts on desktop to just double-click them later when I want to access the data. The thing is Obsidian vault is not represented by a recognizable file; it's a folder. So there is nothing to click at to automatically open it in Obsidian and consequently there is no way to create a shortcut on desktop that would open the specific Obsidian vault. Yes, I know, I can launch Obsidian app and start from there but it is too much hustle when you have several frequently used vaults. Also, the standard F2 shortcut for the usual item renaming does not work and it adds friction.
  • kepano 4y ago
    Have you looked at Obsidian URIs? It has a vault parameter: https://help.obsidian.md/Advanced+topics/Using+obsidian+URI https://help.obsidian.md/Advanced+topics/Using+obsidian+URI
    • garganzol 4y ago
      Thank you. But it does not solve the issue. The custom URI concept is too complex and alien in the Windows world. A Windows user would much better prefer to have a special anchor file in Obsidian vault folder that could be double-clicked and treated by the standard and observable means. This is why .txt files are so popular. A double-click and they work. The specialized tools may be 100 times better, but they often miss one important detail: frictionless entry. If something causes friction, especially at the start, then it gradually becomes a burden a user doesn't want to deal with. However, you advice solves the issue for me because I'm a technical user and you have kindly presented the information. But just imagine how many of those who would totally miss that.
      • criddell 4y ago
        This is a great opportunity for you! This is a problem you know lots of people have and since you are a technical user, you could probably solve this for yourself and others in the same situation. Write a small application and register a file extension for it (maybe .obsidian). When you double click on sql.obsidian (for example), your app would launch read that file then launch Obsidian via the obsidian:\\ protocol. Your launcher app could also handle the creating of .obsidian files or (even better), write a plugin for obsidian to export a .obsidian file.
• ptato 4y ago
  That looks great. I had no idea this was coming. Now I wonder which other ideas the Obsidian team has.
  • input_sh 4y ago
    FYI there's a public roadmap: https://trello.com/b/Psqfqp7I/obsidian-roadmap https://trello.com/b/Psqfqp7I/obsidian-roadmap Tasks are usually not very descriptive, but you get a sense of what's to come.
    • rcarr 4y ago
      I’m looking forward to seeing what their implementation of tasks looks like and how it stacks up next to org mode and its agenda. The user implemented task plugins aren’t up to job I don’t think. If it’s mega then I might switch to using it for task management but I am finding the combination of taskpaper and OmniFocus to be awesome at the minute
      • kbd 4y ago
        Hey, cool, thanks for pointing out they're working on task management. I currently use the Tasks plugin and it works ok, but it took some fiddling with queries to get the right display, it's a little flaky (doesn't update results all the time), and there's no concept of subtasks. I still haven't found my perfect task management system... really interested to see how Obsidian folks tackle this as a core plugin.
        • rcarr 4y ago
          If you can stomach the cost, OmniFocus and Taskpaper combined is the best I’ve found so far after trying more apps and systems than I could count using both hands and feet. In Taskpaper you can very quickly write out a detailed project with all kinds of sub tasks. Then when you’re finished you simply copy it and paste it into OmniFocus which automatically turns it into a full project. You get the best of both worlds with this; really quick project planning in the early stages and then the full capabilities of dedicated task management software for your day to day.
• tianqi 4y ago
  While the feature itself was interesting, adding such a feature made alarm in my head. I don't think this is necessarily a good trend. Please Obsidian needs to be very, very cautious about adding such large features. I won't forget why I, and many others, gave up Evernote. It did too much, not too little.
  • kepano 4y ago
    Obsidian is built on a modular architecture. Canvas view is a plugin so you can turn it off if you don't want to use it. Not much is changing with the core. You can still run Obsidian as a very lightweight app with most plugins disabled.
    • tianqi 4y ago
      Thanks. That's what I like about Obsidian, a flexible tool kit, instead of KFC party bucket. I just wanted to (self-servingly) remind Obsidian to keep in mind not to go down that road.
    • localhost 4y ago
      I've taken to calling Obsidian "The VS Code of Text" for this very reason. Thanks for all you do for building a fantastic tool that I use every day!
      • niels_bom 4y ago
        It’s in that direction, but I also think VS Code offers more and more flexible extension points. I was reading the plug-in development documentation [0] this morning and the ways in which you can extend Obsidian feels relatively limited. I hope they’ll add more things to hook into. 0: https://marcus.se.net/obsidian-plugin-docs/user-interface https://marcus.se.net/obsidian-plugin-docs/user-interface
        • niels_bom 4y ago
          Ah, they are extending the API: https://github.com/obsidianmd/obsidian-api/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md#v110-2022-12-05--insider-build https://github.com/obsidianmd/obsidian-api/blob/master/CHANG...
• rcarr 4y ago
  I wonder if Apple will try and integrate Apple Notes (I know you can already add text but I mean existing notes in the other native app) in the new Freeform app to try and compete with this
• codalan 4y ago
  This is pretty amazing. They've basically implemented some of the best features of old Evernote, w/o fng it up like Evernote.
• desireco42 4y ago
  This is fantastic development, something that really makes a difference in how you can use Obsidian. I got notified from LogSeq group that they are also introducing whiteboard, so clearly innovation is happening at really good pace. There is more room for innovation, as these "thinking spaces" are still inflexible and I expect to see more good things. Obsidian has huge advantage that is open and you are never scared to lose your work in somebody's walled garden. To me, this is more important then any VR or anything like this as it helps us use computers to think and collaborate, augment our abilities. What were original reason for making computers, not just enslaving our attention in dopamine loop.
• LunarAurora 4y ago
  Coupled with a dynamic plugins ecosystem, this is going to be a game changer (even in an already somewhat crowded market [1]) For example, (future) plugins for advanced filtering and automatic layouts [2] will certainly help manipulate very large canvases. [1] Most of it is online/collaborative (https://infinitecanvas.tools/gallery/ https://infinitecanvas.tools/gallery/) though so it is not exactly the same. [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrbLZvHDPqI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrbLZvHDPqI
• wiradikusuma 4y ago
  How does this fit into the existing Obsidian notes and ecosystem of plugins?
• Kunix 4y ago
  Very nice! Happy to see this evolution coming from Obsidian, it seems like a more natural way to organize concepts and ideas. One question: It seems it could be troublesome to have to move / resize everything when adding a new card once a canvas is already quite busy. Is there something like auto-layout in the work, to handle these situations? (like to automatically re-layout cards and groups once adding a new item in between)
  • kepano 4y ago
    There are several layout options you can use to easily align and rearrange cards on the canvas. We have considered a "clean up" shortcut to reorganize the whole canvas at once but haven't gotten there yet.
• y-curious 4y ago
  Miro is in shambles looking at this! Good stuff.
• alpaca128 4y ago
  I am amazed how Obsidian adds new features that are exactly what I was looking for. I already liked using it with the Kanban plugin, and I think adding such support for graph/diagram-like notes is the last piece of the puzzle for many users.
• bogwog 4y ago
  This is awesome! I only recently started using Obsidian and have been liking it a lot, especially since there's even a (rough but usable) drawing/sketching plugin so I can kind of get the same experience as I used to have with One Note. This Canvas thing doesn't seem like it has stylus support or anything like that, but it's still super useful. Also, I noticed that the flatpak version is currently outdated. Anyone know when that will get updated?
• FiReaNG3L 4y ago
  Obsidian has given me everything I had dreamed of in terms of organizing tools, and now this is the cherry on top! I tried so many mindmap software (many paid!) and they all fell short 20 different ways, this is great to see!
• chadlavi 4y ago
  this is huge. Would also love the ability to draw on one of these (something like tldraw.com)
• Dnguyen 4y ago
  I've heard about Obsidian for a while but never got around to using it. Does anyone know if I can take notes and highlight on a web page and include that onto canvas? That's what I'm looking for, notes close to the source as possible.
  • mknapper1 4y ago
    I'm not sure if that is available out of the box, I haven't seen it if it is. But the killer feature of Obsidian is the community plugin ecosystem. I would be surprised if a plugin isn't available soon so make this happen.
  • Terretta 4y ago
    Perhaps Readwise Reader with Obsidian exporter can do what you want. // I capture entire webpage into markdown then annotate markdown.
  • rounakdatta 4y ago
    There's the very good tool Hypothes.is for taking notes and highlights. If the Obsidian community can develop a plugin that can obtain the stream of highlights from the Hypothesis API, then I guess that is possible.
• psychomugs 4y ago
  Obsidian is the tool I wish I had during grad school. Thank you for the continued improvements and dedication to modularity.
• ohyoutravel 4y ago
  This is great, feels like Miro or Draw.io inside Obsidian. I’ve been a long time obsidian subscriber and really enjoy the software.
• danbruc 4y ago
  Marginally related rant. Why on earth is the macOS download a 153 MiB ZIP file that expands into 363 MiB of stuff? Why does every Electron app have to come with its own copy of Electron? I miss the times when Windows came on seven 1.44 MB floppies and you did not even need all of them because they mostly contain drivers for hardware you didn't have. Actually I don't miss the time, swapping floppies was annoying. But really, is the amount of space, bandwidth and clock cycles we carelessly waste really justified by the gain in productivity and achievable complexity?
  • slymon99 4y ago
    > But really, is the amount of space, bandwidth and clock cycles we carelessly waste really justified by the gain in productivity and achievable complexity? Yes. Space, bandwidth, CPU cycles are cheap, especially for this sort of application. Developers are expensive.
    • danbruc 4y ago
      Sure, that is the standard response, but multiply the waste by the number of users, the costs that you externalize by making them pay for faster hardware and more storage and bandwidth.
      • malfist 4y ago
        Is it though? You're probably running on something with plenty of spare clock cycles and extra RAM. It's not like end users are suddenly paying a real cost for extra ram usage when the next electron app comes along. A couple hundred megabytes on a terabyte or larger harddrive? Who cares.
        • danbruc 4y ago
          But why do I have those? My notebook could cost $10 if 640 kiB of RAM and 1 GB of storage were enough. I am of course not expecting that everything should work on a system from 30 years ago, we really made use of more powerful systems to do things that were impossible before, but I think we could still do a lot better.
• kennedy 4y ago
  its gotten too much love <3 ``` ServerBusyEgress is over the account limit. RequestId:ce64eac5-e01e-0071-6897-14c44e000000 Time:2022-12-20T17:22:50.8918472Z ```
• kid64 4y ago
  Obsidian Team, help me out here. What are some actual use cases for canvas? Specifically, how does this enhance the user's ability to record, synthesize, and recall their ideas? I am a huge Obsidian fan, I fully understand what canvas does and how it's used. But I don't get the point. I see the team devoting lots of energy to this feature, so I assume I'm missing something.
  • mpalmer 4y ago
    It's another level of organization and visualization of Obsidian content, and is extensible just like Obsidian's other core features. But the spatial dimension really opens up other opportunities. For instance, I've been using the webviews to create workspaces for the various tasks I do - code review, writing/drafting documents. Being able to drag and drop content from various places (including webviews) into the canvas feels magic. With a few minor usability enhancements I'd probably be ready to call this my new favorite web browser! But generally, it's an interface for expressing relationships between pieces of Obsidian content. Absent additional plugins, these relationships are user-defined, but they could easily be generated since they're pure JSON. Sky's the limit if you ask me. I'm excited to start writing a plugin that enhances the webviews a bit.
  • kepano 4y ago
    Check out the #showcase-canvas channel in the Obsidian Discord group https://obsidian.md/community https://obsidian.md/community Use cases I have seen shared in the channel: family trees, storyboards, taxonomy, mind maps, workflow diagrams, roadmaps, research notes, project management, etc. In my personal use of Canvas, I have been using it for planning house renovation project, developing a new baking recipe (with images of the various iterations). It can also be used as a scratchpad alongside YouTube videos or web pages that you want to annotate.
• smusamashah 4y ago
  This looks like finally an alternative to OneNote. Since every page in OneNote is like an infinite page or canvas, I use it at work to dump info freely anywhere. The tabs and folder interface helps organizing those notes. But now when my notes are increasing OneNote don't offer a lot to organize these. Its bad at linking the notes too. This looks a very good alternative with open specs. No other tool had this kind of canvas like OneNote before.
  • sureglymop 4y ago
    But still no note taking e.g. with an Apple Pen. Would be amazing if Obsidian Mobile added that.
• Obertr 4y ago
  It is ideal. I love it!
• juliushuijnk 4y ago
  if you want try something for capturing your ideas on mobile, you can try TinyUX. https://www.tinyux.app https://www.tinyux.app It's grid based, low-fi, for visual ideas like wireframes.
• pesnk 4y ago
  Obsidian is by far my favorite note taking app of all time. I always try new ones for specific stuff to see how each can improve my productivity daily, but I always stick with it for all my most important things. This canvas product being opensourced and migrateable is great specially for users that try different things like me.
• sureglymop 4y ago
  The only thing I am missing from Obsidian is PDF annotating as Logseq has it. Basically, you open a pdf and whatever you highlight you can copy as a link and put on any page. Then, clicking the link opens the pdf back up at that spot.
  • kepano 4y ago
    Not quite there yet, but there is an Obsidian plugin developing similar functionality: https://github.com/MohrJonas/obsidian-ocr https://github.com/MohrJonas/obsidian-ocr
  • yangikan 4y ago
    is there a video of this feature?
    • sureglymop 4y ago
      Found this YouTube video showing and explaining it: https://youtu.be/OOZA7APwZy4 https://youtu.be/OOZA7APwZy4
• s1mon 4y ago
  As evidenced by a link to AlternativeTo on their own site, this space has a lot (145+) of competition [0]. At some level, I worry about using things much more complex than a text file, because of portability and longevity. It's enough of a pain transitioning between Google and Microsoft (and back) every few years based on various jobs. I have files from the late 1980's that I can still read, but only with Libre Office because Apple's supplied apps can't read old MacWrite files. Some people swear by OneNote or Notion or Keep or various mind mapping software, but keeping things cross platform and simple is a challenge. I was never an Evernote person, but it sounds like that turned into a bit of a debacle. These tools work for now, but will they work 5 or 10 years from now? [0] https://alternativeto.net/software/obsidian/ https://alternativeto.net/software/obsidian/
  • arcturus17 4y ago
    I'm also worried by this, which is precisely why I'm considering a move to Obsidian from Notion. I'm pretty much writing everything in Markdown by now, including my personal blog.
    • joemi 4y ago
      How is moving from Obsidian to Notion relevant? They're basically the same thing?
      • infinityio 4y ago
        The difference is with a local-first editor (like Obsidian) you hopefully get to keep your files if the company stops being nice
      • arcturus17 4y ago
        I keep losing my files with cloud-first systems. I had a trove of notes in Evernote and I don't even remember which email I used to open it, nor if they are there anymore. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't lose local-first markdown files, as I could do the same thing I do with code: keep them in git, and then have a cloud backup for good measure.
• arcturus17 4y ago
  I'm going off on a tangent, but while we have you markdown geeks here: does anyone have any experience editing it with Vim? Do you recommend any plugins or similar? The only real problem I have with markdown is that if I have editor soft-wraps, Vim doesn't work that well (I can't properly navigate soft-wrap lines, because there is a mismatch between what I see and what the editor understands as a line). If I do hard-wraps (new-lines), then the doc loses copy-paste portability to something like Docs. Anyone know how to solve this?
  • potas 4y ago
    You can always use `gj`/`gk` instead of `j`/`k` to move down/up a visual (soft-wrapped) line. If you find it inconvenient, you can always remap bindings to work however you like [0]. You can even limit the mapping to specific file type (e.g. markdown). As for copying to other formats, I stick to 80-character line length limit, so when I need to copy markdown text somewhere else I simply copy it from a rendered markdown document. [0] https://vim.fandom.com/wiki/Move_cursor_by_display_lines_when_wrapping https://vim.fandom.com/wiki/Move_cursor_by_display_lines_whe...
• _def 4y ago
  Cool, can't wait to try it out. Would love to move to obsidian fully, as of now I'm also using Joplin for my main set of notes. btw this plugin really reminds me of a piece of software that I had seen here sometime. An infinite zooming/nesting of notes was the main concept of it, does that ring a bell for anyone?
  • mackrevinack 4y ago
    kind of sounds like workflowy, or dynalist (which is made by the same people who make obsidian!)
  • seanosaur 4y ago
    You could be thinking of Muse (https://museapp.com https://museapp.com).
• 9erdelta 4y ago
  hell yeah, I love you Obsidian.
• ulnarkressty 4y ago
  This kind of feature would obviously not be able to be implemented into a (easily readable) markdown file, so, as Obsidian is willing to go to the proprietary open format route, could someone please consider adding usable tables as a feature? Even simple stuff like multiline cells would greatly increase the usability of the tool. The current table experience even with the community plugins is... not ideal.
  • kepano 4y ago
    I don't think we need to step out of Markdown to improve table editing. It could be solved by making a WYSIWYG table editor for Live Preview.
  • folli 4y ago
    I agree, I'm a big fan of tables when jotting down ideas to compare and contrast multiple aspects etc. But as much as I like markdown for its simplicity, tables are a major PITA, almost to the point of complete uselessness.
  • aussiesnack 4y ago
    I haven't tried any of the community plugins - if any of them come close to what you want, why not file issues outlining what needs improving? I've only used Obsidian tangentially, but from 10000ft it does look like the app tends to incorporate the best plugin ideas over time, so this route might get what you want into the app eventually. Emacs org-mode does demonstrate that it is possible to create a usable interface for text-mode tables.
    • flylikeabanana 4y ago
      Org mode tables have a lot to polish though. I'd love to see word wrapping in org tables but the current solutions all leave a lot to be desired
      • aussiesnack 4y ago
        Sure - it's a long time since I used it so I'll take your word for that. But it demonstrates the principle.
• sleight42 4y ago
  I've been concerned about Obsidian sync. IIRC, data goes to AWS servers but where does it go from there? From reading the Obsidian website, they seem a tiny company. However, it is unclear where they are based and, therefore, what legal obligations they are operating under. What more, Obsidian has so far avoided the levels of compliance that allows for adoption by big businesses. I love me some Obsidian but I'm mindful that, using their services, I just don't know how my data is being treated. I realize vaults are encrypted locally. However, do we know that our vault secret isn't shared with Obsidian? Sure, it's (mostly?) an Electron app. But just how transparent and accountable is Obsidian about their operations?
  • operator-name 4y ago
    You don't have to use obsidian sync. Workspaces are just markdown files in your prefered folder structure, with some obsidian metadata (plugins, recently opened, etc). You can back them up in the same way as any files/folders.
  • Royaljj 4y ago
    I can't answer any of your other questions but Obsidian is owned by Dynalist, which is based in Oakville, Ontario, Canada. Their OCN number is 2538019 if you want to search them up, they're also on CrunchBase https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/dynalist https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/dynalist
  • kepano 4y ago
    Obsidian is based in Canada. Obsidian Sync is E2E encrypted so the company has no way of accessing your files. The privacy policy is here https://obsidian.md/privacy https://obsidian.md/privacy You also do not need to trust Obsidian with any of your data. The files are local to your device so you can sync them however you want. If you don't want to use Obsidian Sync you can use Git, Dropbox, Syncthing, etc.
  • pjdkoch 4y ago
    https://syncthing.net/ https://syncthing.net/ is your friend, too.
  • 4y ago
• andreygrehov 4y ago
  Is there a way to access other people's spaces? This would be a fantastic journey across the universe of these graphs.
• caligarn 4y ago
  Just in time to compete with Freeform?
• rcarmo 4y ago
  OK, this is nice. I've tried (and failed) to use Obsidian in the past because I have 8000-9000 Markdown files with frontmatter metadata and nested folders that I just can't get it to work with (they are typically called index.md in a nested folder structure, with separate sections and media assets in the same folder), but I also use Xmind extensively for my personal projects, so this has tickled my fancy. As long as I don't end up with a single folder with hundreds of files, this seems interesting enough to check out.
• low_tech_punk 4y ago
  Any self-hosted sync options? i.e. Run my own service in docker container, and provide my own database, be it a blob storage like S3, R2, Backblaze or SQLite?
  • steveklabnik 4y ago
    Anything you use to sync text files can work to sync an Obsidian vault. You don't need a database. The simplest thing for a HN audience is probably "put your vault in a git repo and push to github whenever you want to sync," though that isn't real-time.
  • ubertaco 4y ago
    I use Obsidian with my existing Syncthing installation (Syncthing being open-source file-syncing software that you run yourself), and it's great.
    • folli 4y ago
      The problem with Syncthing is that if you accidentally delete a file or part of you notes, your clumsiness will spread to all connected devices.
      • schipplock 4y ago
        use git+syncthing then :)
• alexandargyurov 4y ago
  Similar to Scapple https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scapple/overview https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scapple/overview
• dhruval 4y ago
  I tried Obsidian last year but wasn't enough of a value add for me to make the switch from my normal note taking program. Now I have to give it another go. This looks amazing.
  • martini333 4y ago
    What a stange comment. Could you at least provide some context?
• Existenceblinks 4y ago
  Is there anyone else's brain doesn't work well with canvas like mine? It looks unorganized to me with "group" and "arrow". Unlike structural design like we are used to on daily basis like "order" (left-to-right + top-to-bottom), "index" (several kind of nav). When I look at this type of canvas my brain is confused where to start, what's the order because it looks like a mesh. I guess this is for popular brains?
  • btbuildem 4y ago
    I find it useful for some things and awkward for others. I've been using Gingko [1] for a long while now. The ever-expanding-but-hierarchical structure it uses hits a sweet spot for me. 1: https://gingkoapp.com/ https://gingkoapp.com/
    • Existenceblinks 4y ago
      Yeah it's called "miller columns" which I tried (as a implementer) once. The width constraint per column is not quite nice, and when it has more than 3 columns, the horizontal scroll ux makes it worse (I think it's ok on mobile). I haven't found a good ux on tree structure in general, it's just suck.
• martini333 4y ago
  So many here complaining it's not simple enough, and that they prefer markdown... My brain hurts
• madrox 4y ago
  This is something I'd love to see built into the OS. I don't want multiple desktops as much as I want the ability to zoom around a giant desktop.
  • system2 4y ago
    Haha, no thanks. Imagine microsoft doing this. The windows would BSOD every 5 minutes.
    • esjeon 4y ago
      I'm pretty sure it'll be running on a Chrome variant actually.
• i-am-grout 4y ago
  Just started using obsidian a couple of days ago and am amazed at how awesome it is. Tbh there were only 2 things I thought were missing for my particular workflow and this was one of them, so yer am super happy that it's now been implemented :) For reference the other is the ability to view and edit any regular text based file (i.e. .R / .cpp / .py) within the client rather than having to open a separate editor. Must admit am super impressed at how much the team has achieved and how high quality everything is given how small the company is. Though must admit, I do miss the ability to do literal space formatting of notes like I could do in onenote but that's more of a markdown / html limitation than a obsidian issue.
• folli 4y ago
  Awesome! Is there an easy and quick way to convert the canvas into a shareable format, i.e. into HTML or PDF?
  • kepano 4y ago
    You can use "Export to image" which saves the canvas to PNG. We're looking to add more formats in the future.
• crucialfelix 4y ago
  Feels nice and solid! One thing I immediately wanted was key commands and fast clicking to create cards like FigJam https://www.figma.com/figjam/ https://www.figma.com/figjam/ This is an amazing tool for brainstorming and collaborating during meetings. It looks like we can't assign key commands for the canvas actions yet. That will make it much faster to work with. Imagine: - C then click to place a card. This would go into text edit mode inside the card right away. (currently it gets snaggled up with VIM mode requiring me to go into insert) - I then click to place an image, then the asset search dialog opens - N then click to place a Note, then note search dialog opens When you are brainstorming you want to add cards really quick. Deleting, moving, cloning should all be really immediate. I'm sure this can be easily achieved. Thank you so much for Obsidian!
• hadlock 4y ago
  Is there support planned for Graphviz? Would love to be able to import/export Graphviz files
• ynab4 4y ago
  No thanks. I'll use a pen and paper for note taking.
  • sarmasamosarma 4y ago
• surfsvammel 4y ago
  Obsidian ticked all the boxes for me. Used it since when there were more bugs than features and always knew it would be my go to tool.
• aryamaan 4y ago
  I really like https://kinopio.club/ https://kinopio.club/. This canvas is definitely a step in that direction. I hope they (or a plugin) support a feature parity too
• stayux 4y ago
  Dear Obsidian team. Thank you from my heart. As a designer, I have visual thinking, which requires clear representation of relationships between information objects. No more fiddling with mind-map apps which cannot offer this level of integration with my vault. Now I finally have focused workflow. Thank you again.
• Ruq 4y ago
  I'll have to see how much this affects or benefits my workflow, but I'm testing it against my Bachelors Capstone Project, and it seems really cool to be able to create an Overview that visually creates relations between my various notes relating to the project. Very cool! I love Obsidian more every day.
• reneberlin 4y ago
  A true gamechanger for me. The way you all did thing - it drives me speechless. I need my time to step up to it. Thank you, brothers and sisters of mercy!
• probablynish 4y ago
  I just shifted from Logseq to Obsidian over the last couple of weeks. One of my reasons for doing so is that while Logseq does technically store your notes as local markdown files, there's so much added on top of that, that I can't really open my notes folder in Typora/[markdown editor of choice] and have a smooth experience reading my notes. The underlying format might be open, but there was still lock-in. Obsidian seems much better for that - there'll always be a tradeoff between features and portability, but I do prefer Obsidian's balance. I wrote a very rough Python script to help me move my graph over to Obsidian - if anyone else is in the same boat, feel free to try it out https://github.com/NishantTharani/LogSeqToObsidian https://github.com/NishantTharani/LogSeqToObsidian
  • wraptile 4y ago
    I feel like common markdown notes is a myth. Once you start getting into your notes you quickly run into common markdowns limitations and it's super simple stuff like centering images or adding captions. Then you choose to either flavor your markdown or use HTML and it's no longer common markdown.
  • prashantsengar 4y ago
    Thanks a lot for sharing the script! I too am considering switching to Obsidian at least to see the difference wrt LogSeq as per my current note-taking approach. I like Obsidian's community and development better but used LogSeq because of the outliner experience.
• reneberlin 4y ago
  How could you do this all this time, me not noticing?! THIS is the interconnected mapping for humans i had in my spare room of braincells, that were still alive at that time. It is okay because living in a sim brings peace to the NPCs. How can one or a group progress so smooth an idea. Just one thing: how fast this app starts is a less of a blink. Speechless. Congrats and i step down on my knees for this. When Sony says: it's not a game -then this is: not a app in the ordinary way. Needs no praise or downvote. This is something completly different. 'Got to remind myself: breathe in - and breathe out.
• reneberlin 4y ago
  even the sync feature is built in, which was a complaint of another poster (that might not have had the latest build)
• reneberlin 4y ago
  It's on all your devices and of course: mobile What a thing you did crate here is astonishing nad will make me think for a while. In the while i will make use of this. Thank you all <3
• MattyRad 4y ago
  This is cool, but the killer feature I'm looking for is a UI that matches the functionality of grit https://github.com/climech/grit https://github.com/climech/grit. Grit itself isn't particularly functional for every-day use, but its write-up in the readme is excellent and the DAG hasn't been realized by any existing task tracking software (as far as I'm aware).
• lebaux 4y ago
  Mark my words Obsidian will be the next unicorn.
• jcutrell 4y ago
  You know, this actually seems like an interesting opportunity to use this locally as a superpowered CMS for my statically generated site. I’d have to figure out how to create a linkage that can be translated to my Next-based resource URLs, but at least this would give me more to work with than just my text editor to manage my markdown stuff.
• rnmp 4y ago
  Does anyone know how to actually turn on this feature? I just made a new account and I can’t find this option…
  • ryangibb 4y ago
    Make sure you're using the most recent version. It should be present in v1.1.8.
  • pillefitz 4y ago
    Does it work on mobile? Can't find it either (Android)
• qumpis 4y ago
  I've been doing mind mapping using excalidraw, but it lacked an easy way and visual way to link cards. This Canvas solution might simplify things a bit, though I wonder how much "freeform", unconstrained doodling I will be able to do using this. At the current point using simple excalidraw diagram might still be preferable.
  • Dnguyen 4y ago
    Have you tried Free Plane(freeplane.org)? It's a great mind mapping tool.
• qbasic_forever 4y ago
  Very cool. I was just listening to a podcast recently from one of the Heroku founders who is working on an iOS (for now) infinite canvas app too. I'd love to hear from anyone that has used infinite canvas in their workflow and found good use cases. Does it work well for teams collaborating on projects? I worry it could just turn into a more difficult to navigate wiki that's organized in a scatterbrained way--like it only makes sense to the person who made the most stuff in it.
• brap 4y ago
  I really don’t get Obsidian and why HN seems so obsessed with it. Can anyone please enlighten me? Why do they call these notes “a second brain”? How is this “a new way of thinking”? What are you people even writing that requires this? It just seems silly, honestly. What am I missing?
  • gardenhedge 4y ago
    I wasn't sold on it previously but downloaded it based on this new canvas feature. I'm creating a mind map for my new project and creating notes and organising them in a way that is helpful to me to plan the project.
  • atentaten 4y ago
    It allows me to dump thoughts, ideas and things that I need to remember in one searchable and organizable home. Obsidian makes this easy by not getting in the way and it's highly customizable. I find it fun to use.
  • zzzeek 4y ago
    if it's any consolation, I don't get it either. Heard about it a few months ago from someone at a kids birthday party, who said his life was completely transformed by it. He seemed to have the perspective that having a giant waterfall of amazing thoughts with nowhere to put them (until Obsidian!) was like normal for everyone. Whenever I asked him "well what are you writing" he was like, "everything! just download it and start writing!" OK.... Guess I'm just boring?
  • scirpaceus 4y ago
    Not trying to evangelize you, but you may not necessarily see the value in gathering random notable ideas somewhere until you put in the effort of documenting them and then see the network effect in action, i.e., new meta-ideas and patterns emerging from linking those ideas in a central location.
    • chii 4y ago
      > may not necessarily see the value in gathering random notable ideas somewhere until you put in the effort of documenting them and then see the network effect in action or it could be that correlation doesnt imply causation. People who have lots of ideas might just generally be better at ideation, have high intelligence, and perhaps also good at evaluating their ideas quickly. Their success is not _due_ to their jotting down of ideas, but that there is a confounding factor that influence both. People who would copy the actions of successful people may just be cargo culting.
• froggychairs 4y ago
  Wow I didn’t know I could love obsidian more. I’ve been using kinopio.club for this and obsidian for notes. Being able to plot stuff visually really helps me plan long term (especially helpful for my ADHD) Excited to see it is JSON too! Cannot wait to try :)
• MikeTheGreat 4y ago
  I've been using Obsidian and enjoying it quite a bit - thank you for making this, and for making it freely available! I figured that I've give this a spin but can't find it in my local install of Obsidian. I've got 'auto update' turned on (so I _think_ I'm up to date) and I can't find Canvas listed in the Core or Community plugins in the Settings panel within Obsidian. FWIW I'm using the "Commander" plugin to customize my left sidebar (so it might be hidden from me if it's supposed to show up automatically). I must be missing something - how do I get access to this awesome and cool new feature? :)
  • kepano 4y ago
    You can use the command palette "Create new canvas" or use the ribbon item (icon looks like a layout of 4 different rectangles)
  • MikeTheGreat 4y ago
    I don't know if I wasn't noticing the "Relaunch to install update" button or if I just needed to give it a while to download the new update, but after the update (to v1.1.8) the Canvas feature now works.
• Spark_Ed 4y ago
  I've wanted exactly this for a long time. I'm really excited to use this!
• playeren 4y ago
  Has anyone got Canvas to work on the Android client? Any canvas files won't show up in the vault.
• jonstewart 4y ago
  Is it possible to draw in Obsidian (with a tablet/touchscreen)? I’d really like a digital app for algorithms work but so much of it is based on doodling graphs and automata and diagrams. I really like the idea of progressive annotation of such doodles with a note-taking app, but I need to be able to doodle in the first place.
  • xnacly 4y ago
    Sadly not out of the box im afraid, there is a plugin for that though [1]. This plugin is not as advanced as say onenote, but it works for small things [1]: https://github.com/zsviczian/obsidian-excalidraw-plugin https://github.com/zsviczian/obsidian-excalidraw-plugin
• ineedasername 4y ago
  That’s fantastic. Are use obsidian somewhat casually, but this could turn it into a bit more of a daily driver. I just wish that their sync service was less expensive, say $30, instead of $100. Because that’s the difference between being willing to pay for sync vs using any number of computer sync services (be a dropbox, Google Drive, or anything else) to get synchronization that is good enough that committing to either $10 a month or $100 a year just doesn’t seem worth it for the incremental gain. I don’t know, it’s a difficult balance to strike between customers that need it enough to pay their current prices, and more casual users a bit on the borderline like me who are no power users enough to pay that much. Price elasticity is not an exact science and it’s entirely possible they have already filed in the optimum amount for it. Although I wonder if there might be room for a tier that was quota driven. For example a certain amount of megabytes of data or number of notes or some other combination of factors, and charge around three dollars a month. Basically I would like to give them more money to use their sink service, but I might be in too small of a user group for it to be worth it for them to try to target me and others like me with a specific type of plan.
  • chii 4y ago
    I guess the high cost of the sync is to subsidize the actual development of the software, not just to upkeep the syncing. A potential alternative revenue source is to produce enterprise features (like single sign on, or have vaults connected to corporate directories/departments). These features discriminate against casual users vs corporate users, who would tend to be able to afford a higher cost. Obviously, a corporation would then want more, and different, features vs casual users. You end up developing the software biased towards one or the other, potentially fracturing the userbase. it's a double edged sword to play with.
• 1MachineElf 4y ago
  Nice feature, but I'm not interested in managing my notes with something that isn't pure open source.
• niels_bom 4y ago
  Tangent: the Dataview plugin for Obsidian makes it possible to query both the data and metadata of your notes using both an SQL variant and JavaScript and render the results in all kinds of ways. Powerful stuff. Whenever a product allows for end-user extension using actual code it always unlocks so much potential. Even if it’s just for the power users.
• omgmajk 4y ago
  Love Obsidian and love this.
• testermelon 4y ago
  This has convinced me to try obsidian at work. I already use plaintext markdown as daily journaling. So the migration was as painful as appointing my journal folder as a vault, Let’s see if I can make good use of the canvas.
• ysee 4y ago
  [dead]