Draw integration

Plugin to integrate your favourite draw application into your obsidian workflow.

Create, open, export (only to .png for the moment), all this using a single and already used expression in obsidian.

![[path/to/image.png]]

That's all, no weird business with new syntax.

Disclaimer

If you are using Linux. This might only run if you are running Obsidian as a regular application, Because flatpak doesn't allow apps to run code on the host machine (I have already tried it).

Usage

This plugin is based on shell commands, so maybe you are gonna need to know a little about it. But in case you are new I'll leave some examples for Krita and MyPaint at the end, so you can start right away (almost).

![[create/image/link/to/path/to/image.png]]

First you need to create an empty image link, by empty I mean that the image doesn't exists.

The location should be relative to your vault, so if you type ![[draws/image.png]], the image will be stored inside your vault in the folder draw. You don't need to create the folder, it should be created automatically.

Once created you can then run the commands from the command palette.

Draw (All)

With this command you'll run every one of the other commands one after another,

You can run this command by:

1. Placing your cursor on the line of the image link.
2. Open the command palette.
3. Type drawl.
4. Click/Run the command titled Draw (All).

As mentioned before this command will execute the Create, Open and Export commands one after another.

Possible issue

Theoretically it will execute the export command after you close your application, but one can never be totally sure, maybe your opening command doesn't depend on the shell and detaches from it, and your command executes something else to open your program and then finishes, in this case the individual commands come in handy.

Create draw

Now that you created your empty image link, while your cursor is on that line, you can run the Create draw command,

1. Open the command palette.
2. Type drawc (due to how obsidian manages the commands when searching, this is a simple way to find the commands).
3. Click/Run the command Create draw.

This command will create the project file, so its ready for the next command.

Open draw

While the cursor is on the image link line,

1. Open the command palette.
2. Type drawo (again obsidian command search is weird, but useful).
3. Click/Run the command titled Open draw.

This will open your application, and you can start drawing.

Export draw

When you already finished your draw session, you might want to export your drawing. You can do this by running the other command Export Draw, while your cursor is on the image link.

1. Type drawx.
2. Click/Run the command Export draw. This will export the project to a png. And will e automatically update the draw.

Issues

After updating your drawing, and exporting for a second time, you might notice that it doesn't update, this is because obsidian doesn't include a way to force the file cache to update, so you have to force it by hand, this can be done by:

• Closing and re-opening the file.
• Cut and paste again the image link.

Settings

Explanation

This settings use a {template} to fill in the gaps of the commands.

• {this.file} is the location of the project file, this is the argument you'll pass to your program.
• {this.dest} is the location of the image on your image link, the output argument for the export command.

Destiny

This is the location of where your projects are gonna be stored, because you might not want to store them in a regular path.

The location is totally relative to your vault. So if you just leave it as .krita, every project file is gonna be stored inside your vault but inside this .krita directory. This folder will mimic the structure you have defined in the image link. So for example, for ![[draw/image.png]] the project will be stored in .krira/draw/image.kra.

File extension

To allow other draw applications like MyPaint, I added this setting to specify how the files should be called for your projects. So for example, if you are using MyPaint you can use the .ora file extension.

Creation command

This is the shell command you'll typically run to create a file for your program. For Krita and MyPaint there are no commands for that, so you'll need to copy a file.

It needs the {this.file} argument, because is the location in where the project file is gonna be created.

Open command

The command to open your program,

Needs {this.file} argument to know where the file is located at.

Export command

Command to export your project into the png.

Needs the two {this.file} to know where the project is located at. And {this.dest} to know where to export the file.

Examples

As I promised there are some examples and a little guide on how you can get started.

Krita

If you wish to use Krita, you first might need to create a template file, because Krita doesn't include a creation command. And move this file to a directory on your PC under the name draw.kra.

Pre requisites

Install Krita.

Destiny

.krita

The project files will be stored inside the folder .krita, better to have them apart.

File extension

.kra

Its the file extension for the Krita projects.

Creation command

cp /path/to/draw.kra ${this.file}

For this one you might need to replace the /path/to/ with your actual location for the file.

Open command

krita ${this.file}

Of course in case you can totally run Krita from your terminal as that.

Other option to run Krita could be if you are using flatpak.

flatpak run org.kde.krita ${this.file}

Build command

krita ${this.file} --export --export-filename ${this.dest}

Flatpak. (I haven't tried this method)

flatpak run org.kde.krita ${this.file} --export --export-filename ${this.dest}

MyPaint

If you want an infinite canvas, you can use MyPaint. Same reason as krita you need to create a template file, And move it to your a directory under the name draw.ora.

Pre requisites

Install:

• MyPaint.
• ImageMagick (its for image manipulation).

Destiny

.ora

The project files will be stored inside the folder .ora.

File extension

.ora

Stands for Open Raster, and as far as I know and its pretty used in the open source community.

Creation command

cp /path/to/draw.ora ${this.file}

For this one you might need to replace the /path/to/ with your actual location for the file.

Open command

mypaint ${this.file}

If you can run mypaint from your terminal, I envy you because MyPaint in my ArchLinux is a PITA (I use Arch, btw), and don't want to troubleshoot it, so I use the Flatpak version.

flatpak run org.mypaint.MyPaint ${this.file}

Build command

magick ${this.file} ${this.dest}

As the command indicates its magic, because it can turn every image type into every image type (I haven't tested this statement tbh).

Flatpak

I may have found a workaround for flatpak users, using Flatseal (or even the terminal, I just don't use flatpak that much to know how to do this in the terminal) Enable or give the Obsidian application access to the D-Bus Session Bus.

And add this

flatpak-spawn --host

to the beginning of every command.