README

Transform Obsidian Canvas into a powerful mind mapping tool.

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✨ Features

• Keyboard-driven editing — Add, delete, and navigate nodes entirely from the keyboard
• Auto-layout — Contour-based tree layout packs nodes tightly with left/right branch support
• Map outline — Sidebar panel with groups, search, drag-and-drop, inline rename, and bidirectional highlight sync
• Node referencing — Copy clickable links to any node; paste in notes or other canvases for instant navigation
• Insert between nodes — Alt+click a connection point to insert a new node between parent and child
• Forest layout — Arrange multiple trees within a group into a clean grid
• Branch coloring — Each top-level branch gets a distinct color automatically
• Subtree drag — Dragging a node moves its entire subtree; hold Alt to move a single node
• Auto-resize — Nodes resize to fit their content as you type
• FreeMind import — Import .mm files directly into Canvas
• Non-Latin keyboard support — Physical key fallback for Arabic, Hebrew, Cyrillic, and other layouts

🚀 Quick Start

1. Install the plugin and open any Canvas
2. Click the brain icon in the canvas toolbar to enable mindmap mode
3. Create a text node — this is your root
4. Use the command palette (Ctrl/Cmd+P) to add child nodes, siblings, navigate, and more
5. Assign your own hotkeys in Settings > Hotkeys for faster workflow
6. The Map outline panel appears in the right sidebar for navigation

📦 Installation

Community Plugins

1. Open Settings > Community plugins
2. Search for Mindvas
3. Click Install, then Enable

Manual installation

1. Download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest release
2. Create a folder mindvas in your vault's .obsidian/plugins/ directory
3. Copy the downloaded files into that folder
4. Enable the plugin in Settings > Community plugins

⌨️ Commands

All commands are available from the command palette (Ctrl/Cmd+P). Assign your own hotkeys in Settings > Hotkeys.

Command	Description
Edit selected node	Start editing the selected node
Add child node	Create a new child node (selected text moves to child)
Add sibling node	Create a sibling node below the current one
Delete node and focus parent	Remove the current node and select its parent
Flip branch to other side	Move a branch to the opposite side of its parent
Toggle balanced layout	Distribute children evenly on both sides, or collapse to one side
Navigate right/left/up/down	Move selection spatially through the tree
Re-layout mind map	Recalculate and apply layout to the entire canvas
Layout forest	Arrange trees within the selected group into a grid
Detach subtree	Disconnect a branch into an independent tree
Resize & re-layout subtree	Resize nodes in the subtree to fit content and re-layout
Resize all nodes to fit content	Resize every node in the canvas to fit its content
Apply branch colors	Manually trigger branch color assignment
Toggle mindmap mode	Enable or disable mindmap mode for the current canvas
Import FreeMind file	Import a .mm mind map file into the current canvas

🖱️ Mouse Actions

Action	Result
Alt+click connection point	Insert a new node between parent and child
Alt+click a node	Select the entire tree
Ctrl+click a node	Zoom to fit the branch
Right-click a node	Copy node link (for cross-canvas referencing)
Right-click a group	Layout forest, copy group link

Settings

Setting	Description	Default
Default mindmap mode	Whether canvases open in mindmap mode by default	On
Auto-layout	Automatically arrange nodes after adding/deleting	On
Auto-color branches	Assign distinct colors to top-level branches	On
Horizontal gap	Space between parent and child nodes (px)	80
Vertical gap	Space between sibling nodes (px)	20
Default node width	Width of newly created nodes (px)	300
Default node height	Height of newly created nodes (px)	60
Max node height	Maximum height before a node scrolls (px)	300
Navigation zoom padding	Extra space around the target node when zooming (px)	200

📖 Documentation

Find the documentation here.

🤝 Contributing

Found a bug or have a feature request? Open an issue.

💜 Support

If you find this plugin useful, you can support me here 😊.

📄 License

MIT

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[!NOTE] This plugin is desktop-only (Canvas is a desktop feature). It does not make network requests, collect telemetry, or access files outside your vault.