Shimmering Obsidian 🎩
An Alfred Workflow with dozens of features for Obsidian.
- Installation
- Configuration
- Breaking Changes
- Troubleshooting
- Changelog
- Alfred Themes
- Credits & Donations
- About the Developer
Feature Overview
For a full documentation & usage guide, follow the links to the respective subsection.
Powerful Alfred-based Quick Switcher
- Search for Notes
- Includes Aliases
- Search Headings (included heading levels configurable)
- Search Starred Notes
- Search Recent Notes
- Browse Folders (move to parent folders, create notes in folders)
- Search Notes via Tags
- Browse a note's links (outgoing, backlinks, external)
- Open External Links of a Note (without switching to the document or opening Obsidian)
- Graph Traversal via Alfred
- Smart Search: A query like
o foobar #moc starreddisplays only files named "foobar" with the tag "#moc" that are also starred.
Note-related Features
- Create new Notes (based on Template or via QuickAdd)
- Move Note to a different folder
- Daily Notes
- Quickly append to a scratchpad note
Screenshot Features
- OCR Screenshots
- Image Screenshot
- Both work for screenshots taken in quick succession, e.g. during a live presentation or lecture.
Utility Features
- Backup your Vault
- Access various folders like
.obsidianor.trash - Update Plugins
- Carl Auto-Responses
🐢
Plugin & Theme Search
- Search Community Plugins and Themes
- Open in Obsidian or GitHub
- Access Plugin Settings
- Search & Create GitHub Issues
- No annoyed developers! When the installed version is out of date, issue creation is blocked and replaced by a shortcut to update the plugin instead.
Workspace Switcher
- Quickly switch workspaces, either via Switcher Modal or Hotkeys (
🆕 ) - Save Workspaces
- Manage workspaces
- Automatically toggle spellchecking when switching to certain workspaces
Settings & Local Plugin Search
- Search & quickly open specific Settings Tabs, the Theme Browser, or the Community Browser.
- Quickly update all plugins.
- Open Plugin Settings.
- Open local plugin folders in
.obsidian/plugins/
Documentation Search
- Search the Official Obsidian Documentation
- Simultaneously search the Obsidian Hub
- Search the Forum
- Browse Forum Categories
Vault Switcher
- Switch the Vault controlled by this Alfred workflow.
- Open vaults in Obsidian, Finder, or the Terminal.
CSS-related Features
- Access themes & CSS Snippets via Alfred
- Create new Snippets from Clipboard content
- Quick Access to cheat sheets for theme development, e.g. default variables
- Download a theme's CSS file via Theme Search
- Convert a font file base64-encoded CSS
- Convert a SVG to Data URI
Features for Developers
- Quickly open various development-related folders
- Open a local plugin's folder in Finder or the Terminal
- Quick Copy of a plugin's ID
git clonea plugin repository via the Plugin Searchgit pulla local plugin repository via the Plugin Search- Open the Vault's root in the default Terminal or in Finder
- Add & Update Beta Plugins via BRAT
- Quick Access to cheat sheets for Plugin Development, e.g. the Obsidian API
Workflow Installation
This workflow requires the Powerpack for Alfred (costs around 30€).
- Install the Obsidian plugins Advanced URI & Metadata Extractor. Enable both plugins.
- Download the latest release at GitHub. Double-click the
.alfredworkflowfile to install it. - Run the Alfred Command
osetupand select the vault you want to control with Shimmering Obsidian. Obsidian will then restart. (Even if you have only one vault, you need to confirm that one vault once before you can use the workflow.) - Recommended: After installing the workflow, you should configure the settings of this workflow to make use of most of its features. Refer to the Workflow Configuration for further information.
Alfred Themes
I also designed some themes for Alfred you can check out.
Credits & Thanks
- Big shout-out to @koala for developing the metadata extractor plugin, for which this workflow is right now the main client.
- Also thanks to @Vinzent03 for his invaluable Advanced URI plugin, which enables Alfred to control various aspects of Obsidian.
- Main icon by Jack Liu.
- Other icons created by Freepik - Flaticon
About the Developer
In my day job, I am a sociologist studying the social mechanisms underlying the digital economy. For my PhD project, I investigate the governance of the app economy and how software ecosystems manage the tension between innovation and compatibility. If you are interested in this subject, feel free to get in touch!
Profiles
Note that for questions, bug reports, or feature requests for this workflow, it's better if you open an GitHub issue, since it is better suited for technical support.
Donate
If you feel very generous, you may also buy me something from my Amazon wish list. But please donate something to developers who still go to college, before you consider buying me an item from my wish list!