> [!tldr] A local, folder-based Personal Knowledge Management application using durable data structures. This application here! Obsidian is a note taking & personal knowledge management ([[PKM]]) application that utilizes a folder-based, [[plaintext]] backend that lives on your computer. It uses [[Durable File Types]] and allows for no cloud-dependencies, and is therefore (theoretically) your “final destination” for PKM. There are other [[Obsidian Use Cases]], but you've not (yet) made those work. Obsidian is the inner-most core of [[My Core Toolset]]. It’s goal is to give you a **permanent, durable** home for your body of notes. It’s a competitor to [[Notion]] in some ways - but is better suited for notes than [[Obsidian for Projects]]. It utilizes [[Markdown]] and [[YAML]], and lets you embed local files into your notes. It’s got a robust plugin system and is incredibly highly configurable and modular. The aim is to keep it as lean as possible while giving you the tools to do anything. [[Obsidian Search]] is fast and has good power-user features. It has built-in support for [[Mermaid JS]], [[Obsidian Canvas]]es are good, and a great [[Excalidraw]] plug-in. It is introducing "Bases", which are their take on [[Notion]] databases. It has over 1000 plug-ins, including the incredible [[Dataview Plug-in]] (which should become a standard part of Obsidian, really), and my own [[Semantic Canvas]]. Although I decided to [[Only Use Obsidian Plug-ins That Retain Portability]]. ## Vaults are just Folders Vaults being essentially new ways of viewing folders on your computer is Obsidian's **🔥 killer feature 🔥**. Because Obsidian works on top of a regular folder on your computer, containing regular [[Plain Text Durability|plain text documents]], you immediately get very powerful benefits. ### Interoperability You can utilize _other_ tools effectively to edit content that feels like it lives natively in Obsidian. These are things like: - Using [[VS Code]] to find-and-replace text in **all** notes simultaneously - Using [[DrawIO]] or [[Excalidraw]] to edit and save files that live in those folders - Using [[NodeJS]] (or python or whatever) to iterate over your notes to operate on them in code - Using [[LZ77|.zip files]] you can compress your vault into a single file [[Obsidian can replace your directory explorer]]. ### Offline This note is being written at the car mechanic. I've no internet, yet have been focused & productive. I have everything I need any place I go. Sync is handled by iCloud. Or Dropbox. Or Google Drive. Or [[Git]]Hub. Or manually. ### Portable & durable You want to make a copy of your [[Notion]] workspace for safe keeping? You can do a one-time export that will produce a highly marked-up version of your content. You want to back up your [[Apple Notes]]? I dunno, Google it. You want [[3-2-1 Rule for File Backups]] for Obsidian? Copy & paste your Vault folder to a jump drive. [[LZ77|Compress]] & email it. It's dead simple. ## Forever > [!tip] Until such a time as another application replicates and improves in some meaningful way on this feature, Obsidian is my tool of choice to stay. **** # More ## Source - https://obsidian.md ## Related - [[Slip-Box Method]] - [[PKM]] - [[Zettelkasten Components]] - [[Obsidian to Notion]] - [[Notion]] - [[Obsidian vs Notion]] - [[Plain Text Durability]] - [[Logseq]] - [[Obsidian Callouts]] - [[Mermaid JS]] - [[Excalidraw]] - [[Obsidian Annoyances]] - [[Obsidian Niceties]] - [[Obsidian as a Semantic Wiki]]