Author Toolkit

Author Toolkit is a personal Obsidian plugin built for novel writing, worldbuilding, and note organization.

It focuses on repetitive file-management tasks that are useful when building a large writing project: creating notes and folders in batches, generating links between notes, navigating folders through a simple file browser, and using invisible heading-based tags.

The plugin works directly with the files in your Obsidian vault. It does not require a cloud service.

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What Author Toolkit does

1. Create Notes

Command: Create Notes

Creates multiple Markdown notes at once.

Available creation modes:

• Templated Notes --- create notes using an existing Markdown template.
• Named Notes --- provide names for the notes.
• Blank Notes --- create empty notes.

Other options include:

• Destination folder
• Number of notes
• Fallback naming
• Collision handling
• Template selection
• Multiple names entered line-by-line

The active note's folder is used as the initial destination when the modal opens.

Naming behavior

When names are supplied, each non-empty line becomes a note name.

Empty entries use the fallback prefix.

For example:

Alice
Bob

David

with the fallback prefix Character produces:

Alice.md
Bob.md
Character 3.md
David.md

Invalid file characters are rejected:

\ / : * ? " < > |

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2. Create Folders

Command: Create Folders

Creates multiple folders at once.

Available modes:

• Named Folders
• Blank Folders

You can also:

• Choose a destination folder
• Create multiple folders
• Provide names line-by-line
• Use fallback folder names
• Choose what happens when a folder already exists
• Optionally generate notes inside the newly created folders

Notes inside folders

The folder creator can populate each created folder with a selected number of blank notes.

The current implementation limits this automatic note generation to 25 notes per folder.

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3. Add Notes Links

Command: Add Notes Links

Generates Markdown links to notes contained in a selected source folder and adds them to a target note.

Supported formats:

Bullet list

- [[Character A]]
- [[Character B]]
- [[Character C]]

Numbered list

1. [[Character A]]
2. [[Character B]]
3. [[Character C]]

The generator:

• Reads Markdown files from the selected folder.
• Also recognizes a folder's same-name note in the current implementation.
• Does not add the target note itself.
• Checks for existing normal or aliased links before adding a link.
• Appends new links to the target note.
• Sorts discovered notes alphabetically.

This makes it useful for creating or maintaining folder/index notes.

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4. Folder / File Browser

Several tools use Author Toolkit's built-in browser instead of requiring a raw path every time.

The browser can:

• Navigate from the vault root.
• Move through folders.
• Show breadcrumbs.
• Enter a folder path manually.
• Select folders as destinations.
• Select Markdown files as templates or targets.

This is intended to make file selection easier, particularly when working on mobile.

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5. Cheatsheet

Command: View Cheatsheet

The cheatsheet provides copyable Author Toolkit tags.

Clicking a tag copies it to the clipboard.

Available tags:

<AT|Heading>5. Cheatsheet</AT>
<AT|H1>Author Toolkit</AT>
<AT|H2>5. Cheatsheet</AT>
<AT|H3>Numbered list</AT>
<AT|H4>ReadME</AT>
<AT|H5>ReadME</AT>
<AT|H6>ReadME</AT>

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Native Invisible Tags

Author Toolkit includes a small tag system designed for structured writing.

The tags are stored directly inside Markdown files, but the closing/opening tag syntax is visually hidden in Obsidian Live Preview when the cursor is not on the tagged line.

For example:

<AT|H1>Native Invisible Tags</AT>

can be automatically populated from the nearest matching heading.

<AT|Heading>Native Invisible Tags</AT>

Uses the nearest heading above the tag, regardless of heading level.

Example:

# Characters

<AT|Heading>`<AT|Heading>Native Invisible Tags</AT>`</AT>

The stored tag becomes:

<AT|Heading>`<AT|Heading>Native Invisible Tags</AT>`</AT>

<AT|H1>Native Invisible Tags</AT> through <AT|H6>ReadME</AT>

These target a specific heading level.

For example:

# Characters

## Main Character

<AT|H2>`<AT|H1>Native Invisible Tags</AT>` through `<AT|H6>ReadME</AT>`</AT>

becomes:

<AT|H2>`<AT|H1>Native Invisible Tags</AT>` through `<AT|H6>ReadME</AT>`</AT>

If no matching heading exists above the tag, the current note's filename is used as the fallback.

Important behavior

The tag processor runs when a Markdown file is opened.

The processor reads the file's heading metadata and updates empty/already-populated Author Toolkit tags.

The underlying tags remain in the Markdown file. The CodeMirror extension only changes how they are displayed in Live Preview.

This means the tags are not merely visual formatting. They are actual Markdown text stored in the vault.

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Undo and Redo

Author Toolkit has its own action history for supported operations.

Commands:

• Undo Last Toolkit Action
• Redo Last Toolkit Action

The history system currently keeps up to 50 actions in memory.

Supported operations include actions such as:

• Creating notes
• Creating folders
• Adding generated links

A new action clears the redo history.

Undo/redo is Author Toolkit's own history system. It is separate from Obsidian's normal editor undo history.

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Settings

Author Toolkit stores its settings using Obsidian's plugin data system.

The settings are intended to control defaults, rather than remove the choices from individual modals.

Templates Folder Path

Sets the default folder used when browsing for templates.

Example:

05 Templates

or:

Templates/Characters

When a template is selected, the browser can start from this location.

Default Note Creation Mode

Controls which mode is selected when Create Notes opens.

Options:

• Templated Notes
• Named Notes
• Blank Notes

Default Folder Creation Mode

Controls which mode is selected when Create Folders opens.

Options:

• Named Folders
• Blank Folders

Default Note Collision Strategy

Controls what happens when a note with the requested path already exists.

Options:

• Rename --- create a unique name such as Note (2).md.
• Skip --- leave the existing file untouched and skip the new note.
• Replace --- overwrite the existing note.
• Cancel --- stop the operation.

Default Folder Collision Strategy

Controls what happens when a folder with the requested path already exists.

Options:

• Rename --- create a unique folder name.
• Skip --- leave the existing folder untouched.
• Use existing --- continue using the existing folder.
• Cancel --- stop the operation.

Default Link Format

Controls the initial format selected by Add Notes Links.

Options:

• Bullet List
• Numbered List

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Feedback & Contact

Found a bug, have an idea, or want to see a feature added to Author Toolkit?

Feel free to reach out on Discord:

Discord: coconutshell0610

If you find a bug, please include as much information as possible, such as:

• What you were trying to do
• What happened
• What you expected to happen
• Any error message you received
• Steps to reproduce the problem, if possible

If there's a feature you'd like to see in Author Toolkit, let me know as well. User feedback helps determine which features are worth adding and improving.

Discord: coconutshell0610