Erica Xu

Obsidian — A powerful knowledge base that works on local Markdown files

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Obsidian is a powerful knowledge base that works on top of a local folder of plain text Markdown files.

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Ollie Taylor
It's actually kinda ridiculous how frequently Obsidian is posting updates and releases. If you like owning your content and/or markdown then this is a great tool to manage your notes and documentation. Now I just need it on my phone so that it's available wherever I am!
Harri Taylor
@theolliejt my current work around is to use working copy + pretext on ios. cant wait for proper obsidian integration!
Erica Xu
@theolliejt Getting Obsidian onto your phone as soon as possible! 💪
Ryan J A Murphy
@theolliejt @_harritaylor 1Writer might be a better option—it offers [[wikilinks]] too, though you can't autocomplete with existing note names when you create new ones.
Sam Garfield
@theolliejt @_harritaylor @ryanjamurphy 1writer is the best stop-gap solution until Obsidian releases their mobile apps.
Erica Xu
Hi Product Hunt! 👋 Obsidian is going into public beta today! 🎉 We made Obsidian to be your long-term second brain and personal knowledge base. As you put in more notes and make more connections, the knowledge base gets more valuable, so we think it's important that you can 100% own your data and not rely on any cloud services. We believe you second brain should work similarly to your own brain and connections are crucial in thinking. Obsidian supports [[internal links]] between your notes out of the box, and provide a powerful graph view and backlink pane to help you understand your knowledge. We also noticed how personal note-taking and knowledge management is, so we built Obsidian to be very extensible from the start, and let you put together your own workflow with plugins like daily notes and page preview as building blocks. This leads to our three fundamental values of Obsidian: 1. Local-first, Markdown plain text based; 2. Link as first-citizen. 3. As extensible as possible. Obsidian is a powerful front-end for your knowledge, like an IDE for your notes. Learn more about Obsidian's features: https://obsidian.md/features Read the story of the project and the team: https://obsidian.md/about
Bill Kracke
In the cluttered space of note-taking apps, Obsidian has become "one to watch" for me as it marries the simplicity of local text files and some of the powerful linking features we see in Roam and others. There is still a ways to go, and there will be plenty of challenges ahead, but this is a solid foundation for moving forward and I have begun using this tool daily. Keep up the good work @erica_xu and @shida_li !
Erica Xu
@shida_li @bill_kracke1 Thanks Bill! Local text files for the win!
Stephan Ango
Obsidian is crazy good for how new it is. And the team is moving extremely fast. It seems like they really know what they want out of this product. I've tried dozens of knowledge management tools and settled on TiddlyWiki a couple years ago. It took a lot of customization to get anywhere close as useable as Obsidian is out of the box. Here's what I love about Obsidian: - Local files, syncs via iCloud/Dropbox/etc - Markdown with [[ ]]] bidirectional links and - [ ] checklists. - Automatically updates all old links if you rename a file(!) - Compatible with 1Writer on iOS - Really nice keyboard shortcuts - Runs as its own app (in a wrapper), but can be styled via custom CSS - Automatically parses external URLs (don't necessarily need to use the markdown format for simple .com URLs) - Great editing experience, e.g. auto indenting bullets - Autocomplete for everything (tags, linked pages) - Lots of extra nice touches like graph view and the pane system to open multiple files at once
Saad Eddin
@kepano Thanks for the list Stephen. Re. 1Writer, could you please elaborate on your workflow? I have 1Writer and I'm curious what's the most productive way to take my notes on iOS.
Shida Li
Co-maker here, just want to add that we have an active discord server open to anyone who wants to discuss about Obsidian or knowledge management in general: https://discord.com/invite/9CGnTWD We also have a forum to keep track of feature requests and bug reports: https://forum.obsidian.md/
Harri Taylor
Open development, open standards, and ridiculously fast paced updates in what is probably the slickest and most intuitive networked thought tool out there. Believe the hype!
Erica Xu
@_harritaylor Plain text and Markdown FTW!
Jeremy Pinnix
For me the biggest benefits of Obsidian over several other PKM (Personal Knowledge Management) tools are that it uses Markdown files rather than outlines/blocks, and that it is locally stored instead of hosted. It still has bi-directional linking, graphing, and bubbles up unlinked resources like Roam. The pace and responsiveness of the developers is remarkable, and the community has been so friendly and helpful. No egos! I'm using iCloud for my vaults which allows for very fast syncing and the ability to edit on iOS using any Markdown app.
Luce Liu
@jeremy_pinnix hi could you please expand on how you're using iCloud to sync and get your notes on your phone? super curious!
sarav
@jeremy_pinnix @luce_liu1 Hi, so when I first launched on my mac, i chose the icloud folder to create the vault. Every markdown file i now create automatically updates into icloud. You can now have obisdion on any other mac as long as icloud drive is mounted. They dont have an iphone app yet, but you can essentially install any markdown editor and link to your icloud drive. ( Backlinking doenst work) but you can do pretty much anything else( view/ edit, create add notes etc) reference - https://forum.obsidian.md/t/how-...
Bora
Well, I'm between sharing Obsidian and also keeping to myself. So precious! 😑 It's one of the tools I'm so glad to stumble over this year and even from short amount of time, it became one of the core ones in my workflow, for my research, notes and already acting as my second brain, getting stronger each day. With lovely folks behind the development, a sincere, welcoming community sharing everything they know without hesitation, I feel Obsidian will be loved with many as it is going into public beta today. Which I believe it is ready for a wider audience, as they are working around the clock to improve it, fixing bugs with constantly collecting user feedback. In my opinion they are creating a game changer product, with better developed functionalities, and shows how designing a product would be better if you listen to your users and gain early feedback while developing, not just showcasing through youtube videos with an elitist approach, which as we saw from others that never works. I wish them best in their journey, and will be following along the way.
Lexi
I absolutely love Obsidian. It’s perfect for Zettelkasten!
Nicolo S
Amazing product with an even more amazing team and community!
Alex OFF
Obsidian's respect for users & providing them ownership, extensibility, convenience for their writing is some of the best out there. If they keep up this pace (providing updates every few days) & continue fostering a humble, helpful community (who're itching to develop plugins), in a year's time this will be one of the most powerful, feature rich & customizable note taking apps out there - and all within local markdown files that can be used practically anywhere!
Daniel Voicu
Probably one of the most interesting aspects of Obsidian is how it manages to combine simplicity with extensibility. It already has a bunch of plugins that will turn it into your favorite markdown editor. The release cycle is fast and the developers are open to suggestions from the community.
Allwyn Fernandes
This is an incredible piece of software that along with many other things, got me into the habit of journaling, reading more and keeping notes once again. No matter where you come from (notion, typora, standard notes, etc) you'll love obsidian. The most important bit for me is the fact that all the notes are stored locally in plain text. No analytics, no worries. All this and it's super zippy! Trust me, you'll love this one. Thanks @erica and @licat for this, kudos to ya! 😃
Yury Molodtsov
Obsidian is one of the best apps I discovered recently and almost immediately become a core part of my workflow despite its early stage. It's a personal knowledge system built to last: proprietary formats provide advantages but end up locking you in it – especially when it's about a monthly subscription. Obsidian is built on plain Markdown files that can be accessed by any app and are unlikely to become obsolete. The files are local, though you can put them in any cloud (in the future Obsidian will provide an additional paid sync option). The devs are great and have been great at receiving feedback and adding the right features.
j.split
This is a great product if you want to take advantage of all the latest (and more) features in note taking + personal knowledge management software. Bi-directional linking, graph view, plugins, community themes. But the kicker is you own all your own note files in plain text (.md files) in a folder of your choosing on your computer (and can also sync your database with something like Dropbox, iCloud, etc.).
Jonathan Molina
Exactly what I have been looking for. Thanks @erica_xu and @shida_li
masen
Have been using the product in closed beta for the past month. If you're at all interested in knowledge management or zettlekasten, advise you to try it out. The screenshots here don't do the product justice. I haven't been this excited for a product since Notion. What I love about the project: - You have complete control of your data and can easily sync to Dropbox or iCloud - Offline mode by default - It's blazing fast (currently have 100+ notes) - You can customize your theme with a little CSS knowledge. If you're not familiar with CSS there is a thriving community building new themes constantly. - The devs are supportive, knowledgeable, and fast. - The community is full of people looking to grow their understanding of the world and design systems that work for them. - Customizable hotkeys and a variety of plugins
Sam Garfield
Obsidian is brand new and changing fast. It has been incredible to watch. The concepts and tools it has introduced me to have revolutionized the way I take notes. Now my notes are a living and evolving nearly effortless information retrieval system. I have combined the concepts of Zettelkasten, Bullet Journaling, and Personal CRMs into one system built on top of the tools in Obsidian, and accessible from everywhere as synchronized plain text files.
Phantom Sin
This is probably the best PKM out there. Really like this software. The developer team is responsive to feature requests and is appreciative of the community around it.
Nicolo S
I started my PKM journey on Roam a couple of months ago and a couple of days later I discovered Obsidian. It is far superior in every single way. It has a completely fresh aproach and focuses on longevity by staying away from proprietary formats. Silver&Licat (the devs) are super super active in the Discord channel and at the same time work super quickly to release new updates more than weekly! Obsidian is a very very big part of my workflow these days and I seriously can't reccomend it enough. Keep up the great work @shida_li and @erica_xu :D