Att Meta Map

简体中文

Att Meta Map turns resource collections into index notes in Obsidian. The model is deliberately simple: source defines the relationship, the template defines the fields, and the mapping defines where other values come from.

Forked from Attachments Library by José Compadre Junior (MIT).

What it does

Keep one explicit relationship

Every managed note has a fixed source property containing one wikilink or a list of wikilinks. That property is the only authority for deciding which resources belong to the note.

• Same names, folders, and file sizes never create an existing relationship by themselves.
• One note can point to an original PDF, a translation, slides, data, or other companion material.
• From either the note or any linked resource, Open paired view opens the resources on the left and reuses one note tab on the right.
• The Resource relations side panel lists every source entry and lets you open or explicitly unbind it. Unbinding never deletes a file.

Choose a sidecar or folder layout

• Sidecar keeps resources and notes under separate roots. Resources stay in place; notes can mirror the resource folder structure.
• Folder uses one collection root. You select the exact depth where loose attachments may appear: root files are depth 0, the next level is depth 1, and so on.

At any configured depth, a loose resource is folded into its matching item folder and, when enabled, gets a note beside it. If its current parent already matches the item name, that folder is reused and only the note is created. Existing source relations remain authoritative and are never folded again.

Folder groups can recognize several companion prefixes such as cn_, zh_, or slides_. A companion whose remaining name matches an existing item joins that item folder and is appended to the note's source list.

Let templates control metadata

Each group selects one Markdown template. Its frontmatter keys are the allow-list for the note; a global mapping says which source may fill each key.

Available sources include:

• vault and filename values: path, name, extension, size, dates, and parsed year/title
• PDF metadata: title, author, subject, keywords, dates, creator, producer, and page count
• optional online lookup: DOI or ISBN, title, author, and year

Several sources may map to the same property. The first non-empty value wins, so filename or PDF metadata is not overwritten by a later network result. Re-extraction shows the current and incoming values side by side; nothing is overwritten without the selected row.

Organize unmanaged attachments with ordered rules

Attachment rules move and rename files that are outside every mapping-group resource root.

• Rules run from top to bottom and stop after the first match.
• Multiple values in one field are OR; different fields are AND; exclusions are NOT; an empty field means unrestricted.
• Source folders and extensions use fuzzy suggestions from the current vault.
• Naming supports {{basename}}, {{parent}}, {{note}}, and {{index}}.
• {{index}} is recalculated from a complete target snapshot and uses the smallest available positive integers, so a folder containing 1 and 82 can be compacted to 1 and 2.

Mapping-group roots are a hard protection boundary. General rules never touch files already owned by a group. Rules are manual only and always show the complete change tree before confirmation.

Install

Obsidian Community plugins

After Att Meta Map is accepted into the Obsidian Community directory, install it from Settings → Community plugins → Browse.

BRAT or manual installation

Until then, add Heptazero/obsidian-attach-meta-map in BRAT, or download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest release into:

<vault>/.obsidian/plugins/att-meta-map/

Then reload Obsidian and enable Att Meta Map under Community plugins.

Quick start

1. Open Settings → Att Meta Map and choose Chinese, English, or Follow Obsidian as the interface language.
2. Add a mapping group and choose Sidecar or Folder.
3. Select its resource folder, template, watched extensions, and creation behavior.
4. Right-click one resource and choose Open paired view. If no note exists, the planned note or folder is created according to the group.
5. Before a large backfill, inspect the complete red/green folder tree and confirm only when every target is correct.

Relationship model

The model has three rules:

1. source is fixed. It is not part of the configurable metadata mapping.
2. The template decides which metadata fields exist. Adding a frontmatter key to the template enables that field for the group.
3. The global mapping decides where values come from. If PDF author → author is configured but the template has no author key, nothing is written.

The template is therefore the field switch. Att Meta Map always maintains source; every other property must be accepted by both the template and the mapping.

Layout details

Sidecar

Sidecar groups configure a resource root and a note root separately. Resources are never moved by the mapping feature. Notes may mirror the resource subfolder structure or remain flat.

Folder

Folder groups configure only one collection root and the exact depth where loose attachments may appear.

• At any depth, create or reuse the matching item folder, move the attachment when needed, and optionally create the note.
• A current parent whose name matches the rendered item name is reused, so an already placed attachment only receives its missing note.
• Shallower and deeper files are ignored instead of being guessed into the group.
• After a source relation exists, folder names may be changed freely because they do not define the relationship.

Disable Create a note for new attachments when you only want folder organization. The item folder is still created or reused, but templates, metadata extraction, and note maintenance are disabled for that group.

Templates and mappings

Att Meta Map automatically discovers the Templater templates_folder and the core Templates folder. Additional template folders can be added in settings.

The template body is copied to each new note. Existing frontmatter values such as type: paper or status: active are preserved. Templater <% ... %> blocks are removed rather than executed, because commands such as tp.file.move() can move the new note outside the configured relationship boundary. Run Templater manually afterward when dynamic template behavior is needed.

With no selected template, Att Meta Map uses a minimal built-in set: source, title, author, created, and updated. Empty properties are omitted.

Note and link templates support:

• {{basename}}, {{name}}, {{ext}}, {{path}}, and {{folder}}
• {{year}} and {{title}}, parsed from common Author - Year - Title filenames

If a note-name template requires {{year}} but the filename has no year, the whole template falls back to the safe filename instead of producing a malformed partial name. Ambiguous extensionless links are automatically rewritten so [[paper]] does not resolve to paper.md instead of paper.pdf.

Commands and file menus

Command	Action
Open paired view	Opens resources on the left and reuses one note tab on the right; creates a missing note when allowed
Re-extract metadata	Shows current and incoming values side by side and applies only selected rows
Unbind current resource	Removes selected source relationships after confirmation without moving or deleting files
Open resource relations	Opens the side panel for all source entries of the current note or resource
Backfill missing notes	Scans groups, previews every move/note/source change, then applies only after confirmation
Organize attachments linked by current note	Applies general attachment rules to unmanaged links from the active note

File-menu actions also organize one note's attachments, one attachment, one folder, or one folder recursively. Every entry uses the same planner, preview, and guarded executor.

In change previews, red − means a file leaves its old path; it does not mean deletion. Green + means a new path, note, or source value will appear. Cancelling performs zero writes.

Automation and safety

Mapping groups register create, rename, and modify listeners while the plugin is enabled. Scripts, sync tools, and Git operations may therefore trigger the same events as changes made in Obsidian. General attachment rules do not register automatic listeners.

Att Meta Map never listens for delete and never automatically deletes notes. If a resource disappears, the note and its inspectable broken source link remain.

Additional boundaries:

• Only properties accepted by both the template and mapping are written.
• Modified-time sync updates a property only when the note already contains it.
• Occupied note names fall back to an extension-qualified name; existing files are never overwritten.
• Batch moves use a pre-execution snapshot and temporary names. If state changes after preview, the entire batch is rejected; failed moves attempt to restore their original paths.
• Folder layout moves only resources at the configured loose-attachment depth and marks its own moves so the rename listener does not process them again.

Changes to data.json are loaded only when the plugin starts. Disable and re-enable the plugin, use View → Force Reload, or restart Obsidian after editing that file externally.

Privacy, language, and architecture

• Notes, attachments, settings, and extracted PDF metadata stay inside the Obsidian vault.
• DOI/ISBN lookup is disabled by default. When enabled, the detected DOI is sent to Crossref or the detected ISBN is sent to Open Library to retrieve bibliographic metadata.
• Att Meta Map has no account, telemetry, advertisements, or access to files outside the vault.

The interface can follow Obsidian or be switched directly between Chinese and English. Translation keys are kept in src/i18n/locales/en.json and src/i18n/locales/zh.json; UI code does not contain parallel hard-coded copies.

The implementation keeps deterministic policy separate from Obsidian mutations:

• settings-model.ts owns defaults and persisted-setting normalization.
• sources.ts resolves metadata; metadata-types.ts contains its shared data model.
• metadata-diff.ts defines refresh and safe-fill decisions without depending on a modal.
• paths.ts owns deterministic folder, name, and link policy.
• creation-plan.ts defines previewable note/folder changes.
• attachment-rules.ts plans general attachment moves; attachment-organizer.ts executes confirmed plans.
• note-manager.ts is the Obsidian-facing service that resolves relationships and performs guarded note operations.

Development

npm install
npm run pipeline

The pipeline runs the Obsidian lint rules, unit tests with coverage, TypeScript checking, and the production bundle. Obsidian releases contain main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css.

Issues and contributions are welcome in the GitHub repository.

License

MIT. See LICENSE. Original Attachments Library copyright belongs to José Compadre Junior.