Hello. I’ve developed a Html dashboard for my obsidian vault which works well on safari as well as Chrome. would it complicate things too much if i were to load it ont DEVONthink? the Obsidian vaults I have are indexed in Devonthink. Essentially the idea would be have a quick way of adding information notes ideaas updating dailies etc in the inbox of DEVONthink seamlessly.
Interesting, but it’s unclear what the question for DEVONthink is? Of course you can store .html files and view them in DEVONthink, but it seems you’re suggesting something more complex.
And, no need for green lights from the community. Put your file in a database and see what happens next. If there’s a hint of risk, do a backup first. It’s more interesting discussing results than potentiality, here.
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I would welcome as additions to DEVONthink features that bridge the gap between it and Obsidian, so I could stop using Obsidian:
- Be able to set and display custom properties through front matter of Markdown files (this would also address the long-standing gripe of having the custom properties be program-wide).
- Different view options per group, with a level of customizability akin to Obsidian bases.
This would probably open up new revenue avenues for DEVONthink. However, I think the management/owners are more interested in pursuing their own vision for the product, which is admirable in a way.
I can’t speak for development, but this is honestly a very novel and interesting suggestion. It could actually be feasible to accomplish via scripting but it would a cool built-in feature. And there’s already precedent, e.g,. with Author, Title, Organization, etc. automatically populating properties. Here’s an example with some mocked up custom metadata fields…
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Indeed very exciting. Thanks for the novel idea.
It’s a really nice concept - but wouldn’t this mean that converting from Markdown to other formats would break the custom metadata?
This one goes back aways. E.g., the thread linked below. I’ve always felt the implementation of custom metadata in DEVONthink 3 and 4 is clunky and too limited. And yes, I appreciate the difficulty of implementing the current and previous incarnations of requests to capture custom metadata from YAML front matter.
OTOH, no way would adding this feature cause me to abandon Obsidian.
And which one would? Just wondering 
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mmmmmm … not going to happen
Now let me rephrase my question - what do you miss the most in DEVONthink?
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You did not ask the question of me, but if I may interject my own personal view, the thing I miss most when working on Markdown files in DEVONthink, compared to Obsidian, is live preview. Switching between edit and preview mode does not take much effort but I still find it gets in my way. Everything feels pretty seamless in Obsidian. Just my own feelings.
Did you already have a look at the enhanced WYSIWYG editor of DEVONthink 4.4? It’s not a preview but getting closer:
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No, I hadn’t seen it, but I’m a psychotherapist, so I don’t have much use for those particular improvements, unfortunately. I’m sure others will be grateful for them, however.
But turning on preview and source side by side should make using MD easier.
I used the side-by-side mode on the screenshot only to demonstrate that the theme-based WYSIWYG editor and the preview are looking much more similar since version 4.4. For comparison a screenshot of 4.3.2 using the same document:
I understand your sad face on this post, but just want to balance it by reminding you that for the many people for whom Obsidian is vital alongside DT (or instead of DT), there are lots of people for whom DT is enough. I’m one! I dabbled with Obsidian when it was fashionable to do so, but never folded it into my workflows and eventually gave up. (Its failure for me was simply down to personal preference - I like my markdown files next to their reference docs, and DT holds both easily.)
I don’t use the WYSIWYG editor either as I find having the same text in two panels confusing, but I know lots of people like that so thank you for implementing it anyway! I’m on holiday but personally I look forward to seeing the new syntax colourings when I get back as that will be something I like!
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The side-by-side mode (see menu View > Document Display) and the Markdown syntax colorizing & WYSIWYG options (see Settings > Files > Markdown) are actually independent.
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This is, from my perspective, a pointless exercise that leads to unfruitful give and take. I’ve used DEVONthink for close to 20 years. Obsidian and DEVONthink are two different tools I use in my own way. I don’t need one to become the other or vice versa. I’m not dropping either one from my daily work. Enough said.
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I can‘t let the opportunity pass without mentioning my wish for a Scrivener-style corkboard view of notes. Obsidian has with its Canvas something fancy but I would just be very happy to have an array of post-it or thumbnail style mini preview of selected notes. One could display the first lines of a note. This would support the idea of atomic notes in the Zettelkasten universe, ie gathering lots of very short notes, from which one can compose larger notes later.
Thanks for the suggestion, noted.
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