Recent Edits

A sidebar panel for Obsidian that shows files modified in the last N days, grouped by calendar day. Marks files edited from outside Obsidian — filesystem writes, sync from another device, plugins that write programmatically — with a configurable indicator dot.

Why this exists

Most Recent Files plugins for Obsidian show recently opened files, not recently modified ones. As I use my vault together with AI tools, I thought it would be useful to see recently modified files and distinguish between edits I've made in Obsidian and those made by the file system. This is useful when using:

• An external editor or script writing through the filesystem
• AI assistants editing notes via filesystem APIs

Recent Edits closes that gap. It shows what changed, when it changed, and visually flags edits that came from outside Obsidian's editor.

Features

• Files modified in the last 7 days (configurable, 1–90 days), grouped by calendar day
• Day headers labelled Today / Yesterday / YYYY-MM-DD (Ddd), sorted most recent first
• Configurable indicator dot for edits that came from outside Obsidian's editor
• "Background folders" toggle: hide noisy folders by default, reveal inline via toggle
• "Excluded folders" to permanently hide certain edits
• Click the folder path on a row to copy the file's absolute filesystem path (useful for handing off to AI tools or CLI)
• Right-click → Clear from list to dismiss a file from the panel until its next edit
• Optional hover preview (uses the Page Preview core plugin)
• Includes .md, .canvas, and .base files

Install

Plugin Directory

1. Open Obsidian → Settings (⌘,) → Community plugins
2. If you see "Restricted mode is on", click Turn on community plugins
3. Click Browse
4. Search "Recent Edits"
5. Click Install → then Enable
6. Open the panel via the History ribbon icon, or Cmd-P → "Recent Edits: Open panel"

Via BRAT (For Pre-release Betas)

1. Install the BRAT plugin from the Community plugins directory.
2. In Obsidian: Settings → BRAT → Add Beta plugin.
3. Paste: cwagner223355/obsidian-recent-edits
4. Enable Recent Edits in Community plugins.

Knox Timeline is not yet in the Community plugins directory.

Settings

Setting	Type	Default	Description
Lookback days	number	7	How many days back to include. Range 1–90.
Hover preview	toggle	off	Show Obsidian's page preview popup on hover. Requires the Page Preview core plugin.
External edit indicator color	color	#D97757	Color of the dot shown next to externally-edited files.
Background folders	folder list	[]	Hidden by default; revealed by the per-day-header toggle. Useful for files that update often but you only check occasionally.
Excluded folders	folder list	[]	Hidden completely. Dot-prefixed folders (.obsidian, .trash) are always excluded regardless.

Row interactions

Click target	Action
Filename	Open the file. Activates an existing tab if open; otherwise opens a new one.
Cmd/Ctrl-click filename	Always open in a new tab.
Folder path	Copy the file's absolute filesystem path to the clipboard.
Right-click anywhere on the row	Open in new tab / split / window, Copy path (vault-relative), Reveal in Finder, Rename, Delete, Clear from list.
Day header	Collapse or expand the day's group.
More / Less pill on a day header	Toggle whether files in your background folders are shown. Only appears if you've configured background folders.

How the external-edit indicator works

The classifier combines a few signals:

• editor-change events (fires when a file is being edited inside Obsidian's editor).
• vault.create / vault.modify events (fire for any change, including writes from outside Obsidian).
• workspace.file-open events (used to recognize core-plugin flows that create-and-open a file, like Daily Notes from the command palette).
• File size at create time (a brand-new empty file is treated as Obsidian-internal — wikilink click, "New note" command, etc.).

A file is classified as an external edit only when none of those internal signals fire near the create or modify event.

Potential limitations

The external-edit status is meant to be an indicator, not a perfect signal. It could mistake:

• Edits arriving via Obsidian Sync from another device.
• Plugin background writes that never open the file in a workspace leaf (rare in practice).
• Files modified before the plugin was installed (these stay unclassified until the next time they're touched).

Support

If Recent Edits is useful to you, consider buying me a coffee.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.