Apps
- Add new location - when run from an iOS device prompts you for a file name and then adds both the physical address if available and the GPS coordinates from where you are when you create the note (Requires AFO) Download
- Create Markdown note - creates a text file with a .md extension in a folder you choose on your phone, presumably your default new file location Download
- Add Bullet to Daily Note - in iOS, adds a bulleted item to the end of your current daily note (Requires AFO) Download
- Save email as Obsidian task - in macOS, creates a task formatted bullet (with checkbox) at the end of your current daily note that is hyperlinked back to Mail.app Download
- Get Available Commands - Required by AFO to index commands used by other shortcuts Download
- Create Note - on iOS, creates a new blank note in user defined location ready for text entry. (Requires AFO) Download
- Quick Task Entry - Creates a task at a user defined placeholder in a daily note. Runs on iOS or macOS (Requires AFO) Download
- Sync Contacts with Notes - on a Mac, creates or syncs notes associated with a folder of in the Contacts app with Obsidian. Syns email and phone number only. (Requires AFO) Download
- Capture Web to Obsidian - on iOS, shares the content of a web page from any iOS browser to Obsidian in Markdown format with links and images Download
- Obsidian Web Clipper - iOS shortcut to copy selected text from a Safari webpage and the link to the web page to a new note in a specified location in an Obsidian vault Download
- Add Weather to Daily Note Adds today’s weather at your current location at a user-defined placeholder in your daily note. Works on iOS and macOS. Requires AFO Download
- Add Calendar Events to Daily Note - Adds up to 20 calendar events for the current date from your calendars at a user-defined placeholder in your daily note . Works on iOS and macOS. Requires AFO Download
Today on AppAddict - OnlySwitch is a free Mac menu bar app that offers instant access to numerous system settings like Dark Mode, Bluetooth, Mute Mic as well as mini-applications like keep awake, Internet Radio and hiding the notch on MacBooks.
Today on AppAddict - Plus AI from MacPlus Software an AI app that lives in the background, works on selected text and can be used in any app, is a convenient and easy to use way to incorporate the parts of AI that don’t rip people off into your workflow.
Today on AppAddict - Stats is a free menu bar app that monitors various hardware components on your Mac, providing colorful, easy to read, configurable charts and graphs plus a way to terminate misbehaving apps.
IndyWeb Carnival - Tools, How #Obsidian Cured My Depression, Saved my Job and Gave Me Purpose
I often make the comment on Reddit or Mastodon that Obsidian, a cross platform note taking application, is my favorite piece of software since Netscape Navigator 2, the browser that practically everyone used when we transitioned from AOL and CompuServe to the real Internet back in the 90s. Back then we discovered new and interesting web pages daily. The Internet was full of hastily constructed and esoteric material, and it all seemed so magical. For our whole lives we’d had to wait until 10 past the hour for the radio to give us a weather forecast and now we could use this marvelous piece of software to go to weather.com whenever we were curious. It was revolutionary and amazing, and it took a while to get used to.
Eventually we did get used to it, along with all of the other marvels over the past nearly 30 years. I find myself quite jaded sometimes. The computer I carry in my pocket can do almost anything and I’m still referring to it as a phone, the same name i used for the hard-wired wall mounted rotary dialed device at my grandmother’s house. I no longer marvel at being able to do my Christmas shopping from my couch or following a baseball game pitch by pitch, knowing the speed of every thrown ball and the batting average of every hitter right up to that at bat.
I experienced an Internet revival late last year. After an aborted attempt to retire early, I’d lost interest in keeping up with technology. I quit following the news, stopped downloading software and spent hours scrolling trash subreddits like “Am I the Asshole”. Out of desperation, I went back to work to have something to do. Even though I went back into the IT field, I was still ambivalent. Instead of being on a Mac like I was used to, I was assigned a slow old Dell full of Microsoft software. It did not spark joy. Then one day I picked up my old iPad and for some reason launched my RSS reader. Many of blog feeds were years old and dead but some were still active. I started reading them first from boredom and then with interest. People were talking about apps I’d never heard of. I cracked open my MacBook and started downloading updates for the OS and the hundreds of apps I’d collected over the years. It took a while.
A British blogger, Robb Knight had created a page where people were listing their default apps in all kinds of categories. I wanted to get on the fun. I’d been working in the Apple/Mac/iOS space since the late 90s and except for the short break after retirement, I’d always been fascinated by software. In order to get added to Robb’s site, I had to start a blog. I signed up at Micro.blog, registered a domain and started writing. One app I saw mentioned over and over that I’d never used was Obsidian. It’s free to download and you can use it all you want without paying a dime unless you want to take advantage of their sync service, something I did a little later.
I documented my learning process in Obsidian as it progressed. I’d download a plugin, watch a YouTube video, configure my setup, use it for a few days and then write a post for my blog. I’d cross post it on Reddit and use a hashtag on Mastodon. I went for months living and breathing Obsidian. I started doing all my writing in it. I pimped out the template for my daily note, incorporating more and more of my life into it. I integrated key email messages via IFTTT, Dropbox and Hazel. I synced my bookmarks from Raindrop.io. I started using Omnivore as my read it later service simply because it automatically imports into Obsidian. I started my first GitHub repository to share 500 Markdown notes containing my quotes collection. I managed to get Obsidian to do every single thing I’d once used Evernote for.
Because of Obsidian I’ve been able to learn blogging in the 21st century. I have four different blogs on three different platforms. I’ve got good notes and records and tens of thousands of words of web posts in my vault. Although I still write about the app once or twice a week, I’ve moved on to writing reviews of other software and even into non-technical writing. It’s amazing that something as simple as a plain text editor at its core has been at the center of my tech and real-life revival. It is so powerful and so extensible that it almost defies belief. The community around the app is generally helpful, supportive curious and open. I’ve even interacted with the CEO of the company on social media.
So, to the folks in whatever Bat Cave Obsidian is developed in, thank you for making such a wonderful tool. I owe you one.
Today on AppAddict - Trickster keeps track of recent files you’ve been using on your Mac and gives you super easy and lightning fast access to them.. For writers, developers, photographers and anyone else who works with files. Has a learning curve but worth the time investment.
Today on AppAddict - Amphetamine offers granular control to keep your Mac from sleeping while a certain app is running, for a period of time, until a certain time of day and more. It will keep your MacBook awake while the lid is closed or while a backup drive is attached.
Today on AppAddict - Text Sniper is an OCR app for your Mac that can read text from YouTube videos, PDFs, images, online courses, screencasts, presentations, webpages, video tutorials, photos. It has more features than the macOS built in Live Text and is a bargain at $7.99.
Today on AppAddict - I make the case for Microsoft Edge for a certain class of Mac users who also use Microsoft Office, Outlook and One Drive. I use it on both my Macs and my iPhone and love its speed, rock solid syncing and features like profiles, workspaces and collections plus extension support.
Today on AppAddict - Pie Menu is a mouse + keyboard driven alternative to memorizing menu bar commands. It is a fully configurable tool for activating menu bar commands from a pop-up menu that follows your cursor. Looks interesting but there is a FOSS option available.
Today on AppAddict - I list my favorite apps from SetApp with details about their purpose and what they would cost if stand alone. I also posted a list of all 40 (!!!) of the apps I’m using for the same low mothly price. It’s a real bargain for any Mac user.
Today on AppAddict - Sequel, a unique player in the media database space, tracks TV shows, movies, books, audiobooks and video games. Well designed, configurable and powerful, it is a real joy to use.
Another 10 Random #Obsidian Tips
This is the third in a series of things I figured out on my own in Obsidian, but that I wish I’d seen elsewhere to save me some time!
10 Random But Helpful #Obsidian Tips
1. Quick Access to Frequently Used Notes
Although a plugin exists to let you add notes to your ribbon bar, you can set up your own quick access panel in the left sidebar of adding the bookmarks module. As a bonus, you can use an alias name for notes and drag them around to reorder them.
2. Create Buttons for Frequently Used Commands
The Commander plugin lets you create buttons in your ribbon bar for your most frequently used menu commands. I use it for Linter, Shortcut Launcher, Attachment Management and RSS Copyist.
3. Update Your Plugins Wisely
The Plugins Update Tracker notifies you when there are updates to your plugins. It creates a page with all of the release notes. You can set a delay of X days before you are notified if you prefer to wait awhile to make sure there are no bugs in the new releases. You can choose to be notified of beta versions if you want. You can update your plugins right from the Tracker’s interface without opening Obsidian’s prefs.
4. Create a Homepage with Search, Recent Notes and Bookmarks
The Beautitab plugin lets you choose an image for the background, displays a clock, a quote, links to recently opened notes, links to recently bookmarked notes and your choice of a search interface (native or Omnisearch). You can turn off any element you don’t want to use.
5. Manually Order Notes
File Explorer++ lets you hide and pin files and folders. You can utilize custom wildcard or regex filters based on file/folder names, paths, and tags. Additionally, a simple click in the file menu lets you hide or pin specific files or folders.
6. Speed Up Obsidian on an Older Phone
I contacted Obsidian support when I was having issues withslow updates on my iPhone 11. To get better performance they suggested turning off backlinks and graph view on mobile and to not enable Dataview and Metabind. (Note: you have to have Obsidian sync to do this)
7. Automatically Sync a Copy of Your Vault Daily
For Mac Users - SyncFoldersPro lets you schedule folder sync operations. I run one daily to sync my Obsidian vault to Google Drive. As a bonus, it saves copies of moved, deleted and renamed files in a separate folder, allowing you to pull old versions of notes if anything ever goes wonky. It’s saved my bacon more than once.
8. Add a Creation Date and Modification Date to Every Note’s Properties
The Linter plugin Has a setting to add a creation and modification date to every note which can prove very useful in building certain Dataview queries.
9. Get Obsidian Sync
Quit trying to jank together some alternative solution and spend the $4 a month on Obsidian sync. It allows you to selectively sync folders, eliminating the need for separate vaults, have custom preferences for your plugins on different devices, batch restore files and more. If you are a student, educator or non-profit employee, you get 40% off.
10. Prevent Multiple Copies of the Same Note From Opening
Mononote is a simple plugin that prevents this aggravating behavior. Instead of having multiple tabs with the same note open, it just refocuses the existing tab, saving you time and memory.
Today on AppAddict - Unclutter - Three Utilities in One App - a clipboard manager, a file shelf and a floating notes interface. Free trial, one time purchase.
YouTube Creator, Dann Berg who specializes in primarily Obsidian and productivity apps, also has a monthly newsletter that is worth subscribing to.
Today on App Addict - Upscayl - a Free and Open-Source Image Enlarger and Enhancer - takes low resolution images from old phones and digital cameras and sharpens them while enlarging up to 4x.
Today on AppAddict - Spaces for macOS an app for opening everything you need for different task scenarios - writing, coding, editing photos. It sets up your display with a custom layout and opens/closes everything with a single click.
12 Helpful iOS and macOS Shortcuts for #Obsidian
To avoid awkward copying and pasting and the sometimes long wait before Obsidian is ready to accept text on mobile, iOS and Mac shortcuts are available to create new notes or add content to existing ones. Actions for Obsidian, the collective name for two apps, one for iOS and the other for macOS allows you to automate certain actions in creating notes. It is required for some of these shortcuts to work.
Today on AppAddict - a great single purpose app to create quote graphics. Text Shot by developer @chrishannah@mastodon.social. I saw @robb@social.lol mention it yesterday, so I bought a copy and used it multiple time already.
Today on AppAddict - Angry Ip Scanner - Ever had the sneaking suspicion that someone was using your Wi-Fi? This free and open-source, easy to use scanner will quickly tell you every device connected to your home network.
