Obsidian Manuscript Outliner

A plugin that generates structured outline views from your manuscript notes, showing each section’s status tag and word count at a glance.

Why? Writers work non-linearly. As a manuscript grows, tracking the status of each section becomes unmanageable — you need an entry point every time you sit down to write.

How it works

For each source note, the plugin produces two outline files:

Output	Description
List outline	Nested numbered headings with wikilinks to each section
Table outline	Markdown table with hierarchical numbering (1.2.3), status tags, and word counts

Every heading in the outline is a wikilink—click it to jump directly to that section in your manuscript. Outlines auto-update as you edit.

Setup

1. Install the plugin in Obsidian
2. Configure source notes — open the plugin settings and add the names of notes you want outlined (without .md). Default is Manuscript
3. Add status tags — place a tag like #draft or #review on the line immediately after any heading. See the tag conventions below
4. Generate outlines — use the command palette or the ribbon icon to create outline files. With Auto-regenerate on save enabled, outlines update as you work

Status tags

Place any #tag on the first non-blank line below a heading. The plugin picks up the first tag it finds:

## Chapter 5 - On Being Aware

#draft

Content here...

Example status tags (pair with Colored Tags Wrangler for visual distinction):

Tag	Meaning
#draft	First pass
#review	Needs editorial pass
#refine	Revise for flow and momentum
#final	Done

Tags are free-form — use whatever system fits your workflow.

Output naming

With default settings, Manuscript.md produces Manuscript-outline.md and Manuscript-table.md. Suffixes are configurable in settings.

Commands

Command	Action
Generate list outline	Create numbered list view(s)
Generate table outline	Create table view(s)
Generate all outlines	Create both at once

A list-tree ribbon icon (enable in settings) generates all outlines with one click.

Settings

Setting	Default	Description
Source note names	Manuscript	Notes to parse (without .md). Add as many as needed
List outline suffix	outline	Appended to source name for list output
Table outline suffix	table	Appended to source name for table output
Maximum heading level	6	Include headings up to this depth (1–6)
Content-only word counts	Off	When on, excludes subheading content from counts
Auto-regenerate on save	Off	Regenerate outlines when any source note changes
Escape pipes in wikilinks	On	Prevents | from breaking table formatting

Screenshots

Building from source

npm install
npm run dev      # watch mode
npm run build    # production bundle

License

MIT. See LICENSE for details.