The Ouroboroi

Folders & Files

When you make your first vault, this is likely the screen you'll see. The middle tab is already showcasing its markdown abilities: italics, internal links, and external links. (If you have had system documentation elsewhere that wasn't SP, PK, or any other plural specific app, you might chance a look through the importer link just to see if it's available, that way you don't have to start entirely from scratch!)

There are a lot of buttons, but not to worry! Many of these buttons do pretty simply things.

On the leftmost bar, you'll find these:

Quick Switcher, searches through all files so you can open one easily.

Open Graph View, which opens the same view you already see on the rightmost window. The little dots with lines that Spark Joy.

Create New Canvas, a feature which I'll go over later, but is essentially a cork-board where you can visually organize your vault.

Open Today's Daily Note, which automatically makes a new file that has the date of the day you made it.

Insert Template, another feature I'll go over later, but allows you to insert pre-written text.

Open Command Panel, allows you to do literally everything available in Obsidian.

Create New Base, yet another feature I'll go over later, but bases are helpful for seeing and sorting through all files simultaneously (using tags and other data points).

Above the navigation for your files, you'll find these buttons: new note, new folder, change sort order, auto-reveal current file (which just shows where the file you're currently on is located in the vault), and expand all (opens all folders).

The important thing to understand about how Obsidian works is that all of these files are stored solely on your device. Matter of fact, you can go into the vault/folder using your file manager of choice, and mess around with the files there! (.obsidian is where the things to run Obsidian is stored, including things like plugins and themes.)

The fun part: writing, and notes

I mentioned before that Obsidian is a markdown based editor. You can read all the markdown options they have here, but they have headings, italics, bold, strike-through, highlight, and force plain text -- but also, images! (Which work exactly the same as they do in Simply Plural.)

Obsidian also has the abilities to use tags, just like on Tumblr! You add a tag to a note like #this, they cannot have spaces however, so you must use dashes if you want to separate words (#like_this). Tags are useful for sorting through notes, which I will explain later.

Links

Obsidian has the ability to link to other notes within the vault, like a Wiki! This can be useful for showcasing a myriad of things in a system, like a relationship or places in a headspace.

In order to make a link, you simply put two square brackets around a piece of text, [[like this]]. If the note already exists, it will link to that note. If it doesn't, the text will show up as grayed, and if you click it, it will make a new note! You can visually see these connections with the graph view on the right!

Templates

In order to make templates, you first must make a folder to store all those templates. Then, make a note that will serve as the template.

There are a couple things you can do in a template note. If you input {{title}}, then when you insert the template into a note, it will be replaced with whatever the title of the note is (personally, I've found it useful for not having to type everyone's names over and over again). {{date}} and {{time}} are similar, but instead they are replaced with the date the note was made, or the time the note was made. (Useful for new members!)

Now, in order to enable using these templates (because you can have multiple), you need to click the gear/settings icon on the bottom left. If you look under "Core Plugins", you'll see one called "Templates".

Input the template folder you made into the template folder location. You can also change the automatic date and time format here.

Now, exit out of the settings, and go to a new note. Remember the "Insert Template" button on the leftmost bar? You can use it now! Simply click on the template you want, then it's all there for you to fill out!

Canvases

Canvas files are, as I've said before, one visual way to show your vault. Dragging the buttons on the bottom, you can: add a card (which is just text that isn't in/from a note), add a note from vault, and add an image from vault (these images don't work like the markdown ones; they have to be saved in the vault to be used). If you right click, you have a couple more options, including linking web pages!

Bases

Obsidian's bases are quite similar to Notion's databases, if you've ever used them before. Instead of going off of content like canvases, bases go off of a note's properties. This includes things such as: name, tags, time created, folders, etcetera. You have to manually enable these sorts, using the "sort" "filter" and "properties" tabs.

Here, I have went back and wrote some tags in a couple files, and enabled the properties "file tags" and "created time".

All of these can also be sorted alphabetically, by clicking on the property. So if I click on "created time", the files will be sorted from oldest to newest, and if I click again, it sorts from newest to oldest.

Plugins

Now, I'm going to show you how to install your first plugin!

First, you're going to go back to your settings. Then, you want to find the tab that says "Community Plugins".

You'll see a screen warning you about turning on and downloading software from someone you don't know. The good thing about Obsidian plugins is that, in order for them to be accepted onto Obsidian's marketplace, they must be open source. That means you and everyone else can look at all the code they used to make the plugin. And, many of them are written in very common coding languages, such as JavaScript, which you yourself can learn for free from video tutorials or sites such as w3schools!

If you're fine with the possible risk, click the "Turn on community plugins" button, and you'll be set to start getting plugins! To find new plugins or search for one, you'll click on the button "Browse".

I would really recommend looking at some plugins at some point in time (it doesn't even have to be before you start documenting information in the vault! Very rarely will plugins mess with or touch things that are already written). Because, while I do have plans on how to write a couple posts on using plugins for plural information (such as the Dialogue plugin for conversations, and a mood tracker for front), ultimately the only people who could truly know what, exactly, your system needs out of Obsidian, is you. So really, try out some plugins!

Closing Notes

As I mentioned in the previous paragraph, I may be able to show you some potential options and ways to use Obsidian, but I ultimately cannot give you the way you will need the vault to be formatted. In other words, you will need to spend some time just Working On The Vault to find out what fits for your own system's needs.