Obsidian Planner

Unified calendar, kanban, timeline, and task list for project and time management in Obsidian.

Planner is a powerful Obsidian plugin that brings together calendar visualization, Kanban boards, timeline views, and task lists—all powered by Obsidian's native Bases feature. Your data stays in plain Markdown files with YAML frontmatter, giving you complete ownership and flexibility.

Features

• Four Powerful Views - Calendar, Kanban, Timeline, and Task List views, all integrated with Obsidian Bases
• Full Recurrence Support - Complex recurring events with iCal RRULE compatibility (daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, custom patterns)
• Natural Language Input - Create items with "Meeting tomorrow at 3pm @work #event"
• Drag & Drop - Reschedule events on the calendar, move tasks between Kanban columns
• Item Hierarchy - Parent/child relationships for projects and subtasks
• Dependencies - Block items based on other items with blocked_by relationships
• Multiple Calendars - Color-coded calendar categories for work, personal, projects
• Mobile Optimized - Touch-friendly with gesture support
• Keyboard Navigation - Full keyboard support including vim-style shortcuts (h/j/k/l)
• Customizable - Configure statuses, priorities, colors, icons, and more

Who It's For

The Casual Planner — You want a simple, beautiful replacement for Google Calendar that lives inside your vault. No external accounts, no complex setup. Type "Dentist appointment next Tuesday at 2pm" and let natural language parsing do the rest. Set up recurring reminders and get on with your day.

The Hobbyist — That novel you're writing, the home renovation, the app you're building on weekends—they all deserve proper planning. Break big dreams into parent tasks and subtasks, visualize the entire journey on a Timeline, and watch your projects take shape one milestone at a time.

The Academic — You're juggling research projects, paper deadlines, conference submissions, and teaching responsibilities. Track literature review progress, writing milestones, and advisor meetings in one place. Plan multi-year projects with clear dependencies and milestones.

The Freelancer — You're managing multiple client projects simultaneously. Keep each client's work in separate calendars, track project milestones on the Timeline, and use Kanban to visualize what's in progress across all your engagements.

The Power Organizer — You've outgrown Asana, Trello, and ClickUp—or you just want everything in Obsidian. Kanban boards, dependencies, progress tracking: Planner gives you the tools to replicate complex workflows entirely within your vault.

Views

Calendar View

Full calendar display with six layouts powered by FullCalendar:

• Year - Overview of the entire year
• Month - Traditional month grid
• Week - 7-day view with time slots
• 3-Day - Rolling 3-day view
• Day - Single day with time slots
• List - Chronological agenda view

Features include drag-to-reschedule, click-to-create, color coding by any field, and recurring event display.

Kanban View

Drag-and-drop board for visual task management:

• Configurable columns by status, priority, calendar, or any property
• Swimlanes for 2D grouping
• Cover images and styled field badges
• Virtual scrolling for large boards
• WIP limits per column

Timeline View

Beautiful chronological visualization powered by Markwhen:

• Group events by calendar, status, people, or priority
• Drag events to reschedule
• Zoom and pan navigation
• Progress indicators on events
• Color coding by any field

Task List View

Table view for managing items:

• Configurable columns via Bases properties
• Click any row to edit in the Item Modal
• Context menu with quick status changes
• Colored badges for status, priority, and calendar
• Virtual scrolling for large datasets (50+ items)

Installation

From Obsidian Community Plugins (Coming Soon)

1. Open Settings > Community Plugins
2. Click Browse and search for "Planner"
3. Click Install, then Enable

Manual Installation

1. Download the latest release from the Releases page
2. Extract main.js, main.css, manifest.json, and timeline.html to your vault's .obsidian/plugins/planner/ folder
3. Enable the plugin in Settings > Community Plugins

Quick Start

Create Your First Item

1. Press Ctrl+P and type "Planner: Quick capture" to open the Item Modal
2. Enter a title—try natural language: "Team meeting tomorrow at 2pm @work #meeting"
3. Click Save

Open Views

Use the ribbon icons in the left sidebar or the command palette:

• Planner: Open calendar - Calendar view
• Planner: Open Kanban - Kanban board
• Planner: Open Timeline - Timeline visualization
• Planner: Open task list - Table view

Basic Workflow

1. Create Items - Use the Item Modal with dates, status, priority, calendar, and tags
2. Organize - View items in Calendar, Kanban, Timeline, or Task List
3. Update - Click any item to edit, or drag to reschedule/change status

Data Model

All items are stored as Markdown files with YAML frontmatter. Every field is optional.

---
title: Website Redesign
summary: Complete overhaul of company website
status: In-Progress
priority: High
calendar:
  - Work
tags:
  - task
  - project
date_start_scheduled: 2025-01-15T09:00:00
date_end_scheduled: 2025-01-31T17:00:00
parent: "[[Q1 Initiatives]]"
children:
  - "[[Design mockups]]"
  - "[[Implement frontend]]"
blocked_by:
  - "[[Brand guidelines approval]]"
context:
  - "office"
people:
  - "[[John Smith]]"
progress: 35
---

## Description

Full redesign incorporating new brand identity...

Recurrence Example

---
title: Daily Standup
repeat_frequency: daily
repeat_interval: 1
date_start_scheduled: 2025-01-01T09:00:00
---

---
title: Team Sync
repeat_frequency: weekly
repeat_interval: 2
repeat_byday:
  - TU
  - TH
---

Configuration

Access settings via Settings > Plugin Options > Planner

Statuses

Configure statuses with custom names, colors, and Lucide icons:

Status	Color	Icon	Completed
To-Do	Purple	circle-dot-dashed	No
In-Progress	Blue	circle-dot	No
Done	Green	circle-check-big	Yes
Cancelled	Red	ban	Yes

Priorities

Priority	Color	Icon
Urgent	Red	alert-triangle
High	Orange	chevrons-up
Medium	Yellow	chevron-up
Low	Blue	chevron-down

Calendars

Define calendar categories with custom colors. Items can belong to multiple calendars.

Other Settings

• Items Folder - Default location for new items
• Date/Time Format - Display format preferences
• Week Starts On - Sunday or Monday
• Open Behavior - How items open (same tab, new tab, split)

Keyboard Shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl/Cmd+Enter	Save item (in modal)
Escape	Close modal / Clear focus
Arrow Keys or h/j/k/l	Navigate (Kanban)
Enter	Open focused item

Technology Stack

Component	Technology
Language	TypeScript
Platform	Obsidian Plugin API
Views	Obsidian Bases
Calendar	FullCalendar
Timeline	Markwhen
Recurrence	rrule
NLP Dates	chrono-node

Documentation

Full documentation is available at sawyerrensel.github.io/planner

• Installation Guide
• Quick Start
• Configuration
• Properties Reference
• Views Documentation

Development

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/sawyerrensel/planner.git
cd planner

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Build for development (watches for changes)
npm run dev

# Build for production
npm run build

The build outputs to the project root and can be copied to your vault's plugin folder for testing.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please:

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature/amazing-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add amazing feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/amazing-feature)
5. Open a Pull Request

Roadmap

Current (0.1.1)

• Calendar, Kanban, Timeline, and Task List views
• Item Modal with NLP parsing
• Full recurrence support
• Item hierarchy and dependencies
• Mobile optimization

License

This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 - see the LICENSE file for details.

Acknowledgments

• Obsidian - The incredible knowledge base application
• FullCalendar - Calendar component
• Markwhen - Timeline visualization
• TaskNotes - UI/UX inspiration

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Author: Sawyer Rensel (@sawyerrensel)