Obsidian Starter Course
Who is this for?
- You are just getting started with note-taking or you've recently switched to Obsidian
- You want to discover Obsidian and its key features
- You wonder how to take smart notes
- You want to know how to properly organize your notes and avoid creating an overwhelming mess
- You want a solid system that scales
- You wonder what Zettelkasten, the PARA method, and the Johnny decimal system are
- You have bought the Obsidian Starter Kit and want a full video course to help you get started
Getting started with Obsidian is not the hardest thing in the world, but it takes a lot of trial and error to figure out how to structure and organize your knowledge base. You have a busy life, and you don't want to spend weeks or even months figuring out the "right" approach.
What is this?
The Obsidian Starter Course is a video course containing 2h20 of content. It's a hands-on guide into the world of Obsidian, Personal Knowledge Management (PKM), and the Obsidian Starter Kit.
Many of the explanations use the Obsidian Starter Kit's vault/structure/plugins, but the explanations about Personal Knowledge Management (PKM), Markdown, YAML and recommendations can be applied to many other tools. Moreover, if you're using Obsidian but don't yet have a copy of the Obsidian Starter Kit, then this course is still incredibly useful. It will show you how you can organize your knowledge base, how to take smart notes, and much more!
Note that this product is included in the Knowii offer.
What's in the video course?
The Obsidian Starter Course covers the following topics:
- Obsidian: installation, user interface, key features, plugins, automation, tips and tricks, etc
- The Markdown syntax
- YAML metadata
- Personal Knowledge Management techniques and principles: the Johnny Decimal system, the PARA method (e.g., the Zettelkasten method, the LIFT principle, Atomic notes, Maps of Content, knowledge capture & extraction, etc)
- Journaling
- Periodic reviews
- Templates
- Automation
- Task management
- Best practices and recommendations
- Hands-on explanations
- and more!
Course chapters
00:00:00 Introduction
00:00:28 Installing Obsidian
00:01:05 Downloading and installing Obsidian Starter Kit
00:02:29 Opening the vault
00:03:40 Obsidian User Interface
00:04:36 Left toolbar
00:04:51 Top left buttons
00:05:09 Editor
00:05:20 Sidebar
00:05:38 Collapsing the sidebar
00:05:58 Editor tabs
00:06:58 Splitting the editor view
00:08:29 View and edit modes
00:09:08 Markdown syntax introduction
00:13:01 Bottom left buttons
00:13:06 Open vault view
00:13:32 Using one or multiple vaults
00:15:04 Multiple vaults vs plugins and configuration
00:15:43 Settings
00:16:35 Community plugins
00:19:11 Keep Things Simple
00:20:59 Obsidian help
00:21:49 The value of Markdown
00:23:13 More about Markdown
00:26:25 Creating links
00:28:20 Local Graph view
00:29:51 Navigating forward and back
00:30:14 Bonus: Zwan
00:30:20 Standard Markdown links
00:33:26 Outgoing links and backlinks
00:36:17 Global Graph view
00:38:23 Configuring the Graph view
00:39:10 Linking to non-existent notes
00:40:07 Creating notes
00:41:36 Hiding/showing ribbon icons
00:41:51 Home note
00:43:30 Finding duplicate notes
00:44:09 Finding orphan notes
00:44:32 Exploring random notes
00:45:37 Quickly opening or creating notes
00:46:28 Command palette
00:49:43 Tagging notes
00:50:00 Searching for tags
00:50:22 Tags panel (Tag Wrangler plugin)
00:50:45 Renaming tags
00:52:01 Search view
00:53:50 Organizing files
00:54:51 Outline view (Outline plugin)
00:56:09 Obsidian Starter Kit folder structure
00:56:15 The Johnny Decimal system
00:58:33 Obsidian Starter Kit root folders
00:59:01 Categories
01:00:06 The PARA method
01:02:40 Benefits of PARA
01:03:00 The LIFT principle
01:03:48 PARA folders in Obsidian Starter Kit
01:04:18 The meta folder
01:05:26 The Resources folder
01:05:41 Obsidian Starter Kit User Guide
01:06:54 The Areas folder
01:07:13 Meeting notes
01:08:32 Creating tasks with Markdown
01:09:09 People and Contacts
01:11:43 The Zettelkasten method
01:14:46 Zettelkasten principles
01:14:56 Fleeting notes
01:16:54 Literature notes
01:20:39 Permanent notes
01:23:30 More on keeping things simple
01:23:56 Avoid breaking the vault
01:24:55 Moving notes automatically (Auto Note Mover plugin)
01:27:49 Templating and template
01:28:12 Using templates (Templater plugin)
01:29:33 YAML Metadata
01:29:33 Notes metadata
01:30:15 Adding tags through metadata
01:30:42 Note aliases
01:31:53 Tags
01:32:28 Additional YAML properties
01:33:39 Benefits of metadata
01:34:44 Templates
01:37:47 Using templates
01:39:26 Periodic notes plugin and daily note template
01:40:41 Book note template
01:41:28 Benefits of automation
01:41:55 Templates overview
01:42:58 Special tags
01:43:17 Dataview plugin
01:44:57 MoCs
01:45:30 Capturing quotes
01:46:46 More on tagging
01:47:42 Nesting tags
01:48:02 Attachments
01:50:18 Atomic notes
01:52:58 Journaling
01:54:08 Planning ahead
01:55:05 Using fewer tools
01:55:45 Daily notes
01:58:55 Changed notes plugin
01:59:33 Notes vs Time
02:01:25 Reflecting on the past using weekly, monthly and yearly notes
02:03:10 Knowledge extraction
02:03:43 Planning ahead
02:04:43 More on Knowledge extraction
02:05:34 Recommendation for tags
02:06:16 Linking discoveries to time
02:07:59 Meta notes
02:08:48 Top of mind note
02:09:32 Markdown: Reordering lists
02:09:41 Outline plugin
02:10:31 Waiting for note
02:10:42 Routines
02:10:57 Task management
02:12:45 Kanban plugin
02:15:03 Canvas
02:17:54 Excalidraw plugin
02:18:55 Conclusion
02:18:59 More recommendations
02:20:43 Obsidian Starter Kit updates
Testimonials
One copy of the Obsidian Starter Course