Frontmatter Bootstrap

An Obsidian plugin that bootstraps a stable YAML frontmatter convention for your notes.

• Auto-insert a frontmatter template on new empty Markdown notes
• Optionally auto-update the updated date on save
• Run a read-only Metadata Health Check and write a report note

Works with Obsidian Properties, Dataview, Bases, and standard YAML frontmatter. Desktop and mobile (isDesktopOnly: false). Fully local — no network access.

Features

1. Auto-insert frontmatter on new notes

When you create a new Markdown file, the plugin inserts a template only if all of the following are true:

• The file extension is .md
• The file content is completely empty
• The file has no existing frontmatter

Default template:

---
type: note
domain:
status: active
created: 2026-05-09
updated: 2026-05-09
source: personal
tags:
---

created / updated use today's date (YYYY-MM-DD). You can override the whole template in settings (supports {{date}}).

The plugin never overwrites existing frontmatter keys that are already set.

2. Auto-update updated on save

When enabled (default on):

• On file save, if frontmatter already has an updated field, it is set to today's date
• Missing updated is not added
• created and note body are never modified
• Updates are debounced (500ms)

Turn off under Settings → Frontmatter Bootstrap → Auto-update modified date on save.

3. Metadata Health Check (command)

Command palette: Metadata Health Check

Scopes:

• Current note
• Current folder (recursive)
• Entire vault

Checks (read-only; only convention notes):

A note is in scope if its frontmatter has at least one core field: type, domain, status, source.

• Skipped: no frontmatter, or only tags / aliases / other unrelated keys
• Required: type, status, source; plus created if “Track created date” is on; plus updated if “Track updated date” is on
• domain is optional: empty / whitespace → not vocabulary-checked; non-empty must be in domain vocabulary
• Other enum fields (type / status / source): values must be in vocabulary when present
• Empty vocabulary for a field → that field’s enum check is skipped
• If present, date fields must be YYYY-MM-DD
• Likely field-name typos (e.g. statu → status)

Results are written to the vault-root note Metadata Health Report.md (created or overwritten), with [[wikilinks]] to each file. That report file is excluded from subsequent scans. Other notes are not modified.

Settings

Settings → Community plugins → Frontmatter Bootstrap

Section	What it controls
Notes behavior	Insert created / updated on new notes; auto-update updated on save
Field schemas	Vocabularies for type, status, source, domain (add / edit / delete; defaults for type/status/source)
Template	Optional custom YAML template ({{date}} → YYYY-MM-DD). If non-empty, replaces the default template
Advanced	Reset all settings (double-confirm)

Default vocabularies

Field	Defaults
type	note, project
status	active, done, archived
source	personal, external
domain	work, study, life, project, reference

Usage

1. Enable the plugin.
2. Create a new empty Markdown note → frontmatter is inserted automatically.
3. Edit vocabularies and defaults in settings as needed.
4. Optionally run Metadata Health Check from the command palette.

Example Dataview queries

TABLE type, status, created
WHERE type = "project" AND status = "active"
SORT created DESC

LIST
WHERE domain = "work" AND status != "archived"

Behavior & safety

Behavior	Detail
New notes only for insert	Empty .md without frontmatter
No body edits	Only frontmatter via Obsidian's frontmatter API
No bulk rewrite	Does not rewrite historical notes on install
No network / AI	Local only
Configurable	Date tracking and auto-updated can be disabled
Health check side effect	Creates/overwrites Metadata Health Report.md at vault root (skipped in later scans)

Install

Community plugins

1. Open Settings → Community plugins
2. Turn off Restricted mode
3. Browse, search for Frontmatter Bootstrap
4. Install and enable

If the plugin is not listed yet, use manual install or a beta tool such as BRAT with this repository.

Manual install

1. Download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest GitHub Release
2. Create folder: VaultFolder/.obsidian/plugins/frontmatter-bootstrap/
3. Copy the three files into that folder
4. Reload Obsidian and enable the plugin

License

MIT

Author

Joe — github.com/gmcheck

Developer docs

Build, local debug, packaging, health-check rules, and release steps: see docs/DEVELOPING.md.