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Obsidian Bases

help.obsidian.md

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191–200 of 259 posts

Re: Obsidian Bases

#191

Post by jitl »

dpacmittal wrote: post #133

A little off topic but I've always wondered why Ms office doesn't allow embedding of excel cells within word/powerpoint and then allowing reference to certain cells within word with some syntax. That would unlock a lot of new ways to create reactive presentations and word documents.

Didn’t they promise this with “Fluid Framework”? https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/blog/microsoft_365blog/i...

I remember being a bit spooked when they announced this and their Notion clone Loop (I’d been at Notion for a year or so). Where are they now? Idk.

Re: Obsidian Bases

#192

Post by TheFreim »

turing_complete wrote: post #170

I just started using Obsidian. What is the best way to use Obsidian both on your phone as well as your PC/laptop? I use it within git and google drive. How can I sync it most easily to my phone as well?

I use Syncthing to sync between multiple devices, it works without issue.

You could also pay for Obsidian Sync. This has the added benefit of being officially supported and it funds the development of the software.

Re: Obsidian Bases

#193

Post by jitl »

__jonas wrote: post #178
kepano wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can import all the underlying data from Notion using the Obsidian Importer plugin, however I believe that Notion's Databases export only includes a CSV. So you'll need to recreate the views to be able to interact with them dynamically. https://help.obsidian.md/import/notion

I see. I just tried the Notion import on the latest version of Anytype, and they now seem to be able to import Notion databases, which is useful. They use the Notion API though, not any export option that Notion offers.

I want to build a fully round-tripable semantic HTML “microformat” for Notion data so both backup and take-out workflows can depend just on exports, but right now I’m too focused on scaling offline mode to work on it. Sigh. The first version of the HTML/PDF exporter I built as part of my interview process in 2019, I think we could do a much better job

Re: Obsidian Bases

#194

Post by theappsecguy »

criddell wrote: post #187
hresvelgr wrote: post #162

This seems distinctly in opposition to what I believe makes Obsidian a great program, providing an excellent editing environment and extensibility for markdown. The more it ventures into these types of features, the more they're going to lose to applications that designed for this from day dot, like Notion and Anytype.

I'm with you. I think this should be a downloadable plugin, not a standard plugin. I kind of wish they would slow down development and just polish what is already there. They are on this treadmill where they feel the need to keep adding new features, new maintenance burdens, bloating the product in every dimension. In a few years somebody fresh will come along with a product that's a lightweight alternative. It sucks…

It is. You can disable it from core plugins. Obsidian has done more than anyone else for the PKM community without lock in, it’s quite disheartening to see so many complaints.

Re: Obsidian Bases

#195

Post by jitl »

criddell wrote: post #86

Why is this a core plugin? It’s interesting, but seems a bit niche. How do you decide if it’s a core plugin or a regular plugin?

This is a core feature of Notion which is a pretty popular app (I’m biased tho I work at Notion)

Re: Obsidian Bases

#196

Post by kepano »

hresvelgr wrote: post #162

This seems distinctly in opposition to what I believe makes Obsidian a great program, providing an excellent editing environment and extensibility for markdown. The more it ventures into these types of features, the more they're going to lose to applications that designed for this from day dot, like Notion and Anytype.

You can think of Bases as an editor and visualization layer for the YAML frontmatter in your Markdown files.

Frontmatter is not part of the original Markdown spec, but it became a standard way to add metadata to Markdown files long before Obsidian came along. I believe it started in 2008 with the introduction of Jekyll:

https://tom.preston-werner.com/2008/11/17/blogging-like-a-ha...

Frontmatter is supported by almost all SSGs and many apps like Obsidian add autocomplete and other QoL features around it.

Bases to me is exactly what you describe. A feature that provides an excellent editing environment and extensibility for Markdown files.

For example, my blog is a set of Markdown files compiled with Jekyll, that I edit in Obsidian. Now I can add a base in Obsidian that helps me see the state of different blog posts/pages, quickly sort/filter them, and edit their metadata. It helps me spend more of my time editing Markdown files, but at a higher level.

Re: Obsidian Bases

#197

Post by JimmaDaRustla »

hresvelgr wrote: post #162

This seems distinctly in opposition to what I believe makes Obsidian a great program, providing an excellent editing environment and extensibility for markdown. The more it ventures into these types of features, the more they're going to lose to applications that designed for this from day dot, like Notion and Anytype.

It's a plugin. It's not required, it's an optional extension.

That's like saying McDonald's is going to lose customers because they started selling coffee and muffins.

Re: Obsidian Bases

#198

Post by pbronez »

hresvelgr wrote: post #162

This seems distinctly in opposition to what I believe makes Obsidian a great program, providing an excellent editing environment and extensibility for markdown. The more it ventures into these types of features, the more they're going to lose to applications that designed for this from day dot, like Notion and Anytype.

The “base” name appears to be misleading. I assumed this feature would add a structured data format to Obsidian, but it does not. This is exclusively a query engine for your existing markdown files.

An obsidian base is primarily defined as a code block in an existing markdown file. That code block defines a series of queries (filters, really) that produce a result set of markdown file names.

So… more a way to work with a large collection of markdown files than a relational database.

Re: Obsidian Bases

#199

Post by HSO »

muppetman wrote: post #96
raviisoccupied wrote: post #34

I’m an Obsidian user. I pay for Obsidian sync, and I love the philosophy behind their product. However, and I feel stupid for saying this, but I just find it confusing to use. It’s difficult for me to wrap my head around plugins, and understanding how it wants me to use it. For now, I’m just sticking to using it for daily notes, but I feel there’s so much I’m missing.

There is so much wankery around Obsidian, it's so cringleworthty. Obsidian is a nice/fancy editor for markdown files. That's all it is really. People have created so many addons to bolt so much stuff onto it, but that's all it is at its core. You can search your notes, you can tag them. Just use the _core_ addons of Obsidian. That's all you need. Then if you find you really are missing something, have a look in the c…

yea how about you do you, and live and let live

nobody cares what you think people "should" do

Re: Obsidian Bases

#200

Post by dasil003 »

safety1st wrote: post #120
JonChesterfield wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's _also_ a notepad that runs on android and synchronises mostly successfully with machines elsewhere. I'm ignoring the plugins entirely but getting lots of use out of the text synchronisation across multiple machines.

I just have a notes folder in Syncthing and it seems to accomplish the same thing. Or is there more to Obsidian Sync that I don't know about?

The WYSIWYG markdown editor and wiki links are what I like about it. I’m not into the whole plugin lifestyle that seems to be a thing among the “productivity” crowd.
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