2021-05-15: Better Footnotes, Plugin Synergy, & an Electron Update

In The Community

• There is a new when2meet link for @bri's  Knowledge Organization in Obsidian talk, which needs to be rescheduled.
• You can still vote for a time slot for @phnx's Deep Learning on Networks.
• If you're interested in a Discussing Spaced Repetition talk/discussion by @Jamesb, please vote here.

Obsidian Updates

• v0.12.3 rolled out to the public. It bundles 12.0, 12.1, 12.2, and 12.3.  Highlights include better plugin management, the ability to pin commands in the command palette, and improvements to search. "Backlinks in document" is now a core feature.
• The biggest news is that you should grab the new installer from the website because there was an Electron update that has a bunch of security and speed improvements.

Plugin News

New

• Better Footnotes is pending review for admission into the community plugins list, but the long-awaited feature of getting preview-on-hover for footnotes is finally here (and I am HYPE).
• The Incremental Writing plugin (in the community plugins list, doesn't require manual install). There are a bunch of great videos explaining it on the repo.
• Inline Variables allows the setting, referring, and rendering of inline-variables in real-time. It currently requires manual install.
• Supercharged links allows for customization of internal links based on the target note's front-matter attributes. It also lets you trigger Array, Boolean and Number in front-matter values to style your internal links. There is a showcase on the forum.

Updates

• Buttons had a big update, with a nifty button maker command, inline buttons, and the ability to put a templater command inside a button. There's also a new showcase for the buttons plugin.
• Dataview's new link(url, alias) function allows you to create aliased wikilinks (example via @SkepticMystic). The contains(key,value) function is also pretty useful if you have more than one value possible for a key and therefore can't use where x = y (example via @Zicon).
• v0.0.7 of the Readwise Community plugin lets you configure a sync interval so that the plugin will pull new highlights from Readwise every X hours.
• The Spaced Repetition plugin now has support for flashcard decks.
• Tracker v1.4.0 has better support for chart scaling and positioning.
• Hotkey Helper 0.3.2 has an enhanced plugin browser.
• Kanban v0.3.0 has some bugfixes and added time picker & time support.
• There's a new plugin that adds Org Mode support for Obsidian.

Magic

• @zsviczian figured out how to leverage dataviewjs with the excalidraw plugin to automagically generate mind map graphics. Similar magic can be used to create family tree graphics.
• @Mara created a script for espanso to make using the admonition plugin even easier.
• @ryanjamurphy combines dataview, templater, and kanban boards to automate the creation of linked lists for kanban. There's also a simpler version that leverages only kanban and core features.
• @ryanjampurphy also shared a way to use dataviewjs to dynamically show past and future tasks in your daily notes.
• @pmbauer figured out how to do basic OCR with Templater, which might actually be the thing that makes me try out Templater.

Under the Radar

• This plugin lets you easily convert a URL into an iframe.
• Hotkeys for Specific Files by @Vinadon does exactly what it claims to, and is probably really nice for keyboard-first users.

For Developers

• manifest defines which version to look for as the latest version, while versions defines which version works with which Obsidian version. (Thanks, @zsviczian!)
• @Liam shared the obsidian-daily-notes-interface lib, which handles lookups and weird edge cases for date formats and supports the Periodic Notes plugin.
• Obsidian uses Icons8 for icons. @Licat & @Silver have a membership, but if developers need an icon for a plugin that Obsidian doesn't currently support, @Silver is willing to add them. (Discussion here). Here is the list of icons currently available. @Chetachi recommends anyone needing icon use Iconify & the Icon Swapper plugin.

Workflow Stuff

• There was a really nice example of how to pair the Admonition plugin with reference notes from @Chetachi
• This GitHub discussion showcases @dork's setup for getting hypothes.is notes into Obsidian.

Mobile

• @DukeCephalopod was able to use MGit with their vault, although it's not automatic (requires manual push/pull, but it has GUI buttons so you don't have to mess with the command line on your phone).
• @ankushg uses Toolbox Pro (the free version) to get into the dotfolders (i.e. .obsidian) on iOS.

Feature Requests

• Folder Nodes on Graph View has 25 upvotes on the forum, and I'm resurfacing it rather selfishly because it's something I've been wanting for awhile, as someone who does a lot with folders.
• There's been some interest around functionality to make it easier to resurface old notes.

Appearance

• @Blund shared a reminder that html symbol codes (like → for → ) work in Markdown.
• @Chetachi shared a .css file that includes all the codes for changing things around on the graph.
• There were a lot of typography & font discussions this week; here's a link to the forum thread on the topic. @Korban also shared some typography resources.
• The forums had a handy writeup about how to add Google fonts to theme CSS.
• You can use Ω to sort files to the bottom of a list, similar to how ! usually will get something at the top of your file list.
• You can use anchor links in Obsidian to jump to a particular subheading. Incidentally, this also works for the roundup!

Knowledge Management

• There was a nice discussion about the dangers of 'reading like an academic' when you're not actually an academic' and how "productivity culture" can inhibit enjoyment and depth of learning.
• There were some tips shared about how to get started writing an essay.
• The difference between an index and a MOC came up a couple of different times.
• Some people discussed how to take notes for inherently visual mediums like choreography.
• There was a discussion of how to use Obsidian as a law student over on Reddit (mostly because someone asked, so if you have any tips, please share them).

Ancillary Tools

• iris.ai came up as a useful research tool with a nifty GUI for tracking down articles related to a starting point.
• Nebo is a mobile app with excellent handwriting detection, it can indent bullet points and exports well to clipboard, allowing for easy pasting into Obsidian.
• A lot of people enjoyed this color palette generator for creating color schemes for graphs and folders and such.
• LiquidText was recommended as a great tool for projects, as it allows for the opening of multiple PDFs in a single "project" and has a nice highlighting app.
• You can use AutoHotKey to rebind the insert key to do literally anything else, which I highly recommend based on how often people think that its behavior of deleting everything after the cursor as you type is an Obsidian bug.
• @koala created a CSV to Markdown converter.

Housekeeping

• I added some resources for beginners to the Resources portion of the roundup.
• I also added some resources for personal knowledge management.
• I've been making more of an effort to engage with folks over on Twitter about Obsidian-related things, if that's a place you prefer to interact.