MCP Obsidian

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What is mcp-obsidian

mcp-obsidian is a versatile server developed by MarkusPfundstein designed to facilitate interaction with Obsidian through the Local REST API community plugin. It leverages the Model Context Protocol (MCP) to allow AI systems, like Claude, to securely access and manipulate data within Obsidian vaults. By integrating with the Obsidian environment, mcp-obsidian provides a seamless interface for managing and querying notes, files, and directories, making it a powerful tool for users who want to automate and streamline their Obsidian workflows.

How to Use mcp-obsidian

To start using mcp-obsidian, you first need to ensure that the Obsidian REST API community plugin is installed and enabled in your Obsidian setup. Once installed, you'll need to copy the API key from the plugin's configuration.

Configuration Steps:

Set Up the API Key:
- Preferred: Add the API key to the server configuration using JSON format.
- Alternatively, create a .env file in your working directory with the key.
Integration with Claude:
- Configure your Claude Desktop environment to recognize and utilize the mcp-obsidian server by updating the configuration files.
Example Prompts:
- Use intuitive prompts to interact with your Obsidian vault. For example:
  - Retrieve and summarize contents of specific notes.
  - Search and explain the context of specific terms across all files.
  - Summarize meeting notes and create new notes for easy sharing.

Key Features of mcp-obsidian

mcp-obsidian offers a robust suite of tools that enhance how users interact with their Obsidian vaults:

list_files_in_vault: Enumerate all files and directories at the root level of your Obsidian vault.
list_files_in_dir: Access files and directories within a specific directory.
get_file_contents: Fetch the content of a specified file.
search: Perform text-based searches across all vault files to find documents containing specific phrases or terms.
patch_content: Modify existing notes by inserting content based on headings, block references, or frontmatter fields.
append_content: Add new content to existing notes or create new files within the vault.

These functionalities allow users to automate repetitive tasks, organize their notes more effectively, and extract valuable insights from their collected data without manually navigating through the Obsidian interface.

By employing mcp-obsidian, users can dramatically enhance their productivity and ensure that their note-taking and data management processes are both efficient and effective. Whether you're summarizing meeting notes, cataloging information, or searching for specific data points, mcp-obsidian provides the necessary tools to streamline these activities seamlessly.

MCP server to interact with Obsidian via the Local REST API community plugin.

Components

Tools

The server implements multiple tools to interact with Obsidian:

list_files_in_vault: Lists all files and directories in the root directory of your Obsidian vault
list_files_in_dir: Lists all files and directories in a specific Obsidian directory
get_file_contents: Return the content of a single file in your vault.
search: Search for documents matching a specified text query across all files in the vault
patch_content: Insert content into an existing note relative to a heading, block reference, or frontmatter field.
append_content: Append content to a new or existing file in the vault.

Example prompts

Its good to first instruct Claude to use Obsidian. Then it will always call the tool. The use prompts like this:

Get the contents of the last architecture call note and summarize them
Search for all files where Azure CosmosDb is mentioned and quickly explain to me the context in which it is mentioned
Summarize the last meeting notes and put them into a new note 'summary meeting.md'. Add an introduction so that I can send it via email.

Configuration

Obsidian REST API Key

There are two ways to configure the environment with the Obsidian REST API Key.

Add to server config (preferred)

 "mcp-obsidian": {
 "command": "uvx",
 "args": [
 "mcp-obsidian"
 "env": {
 "OBSIDIAN_API_KEY":"<your_api_key_here>"

Create a .env file in the working directory with the following required variable:

OBSIDIAN_API_KEY=your_api_key_here

Note: You can find the key in the Obsidian plugin config.

Quickstart

Install

Obsidian REST API

You need the Obsidian REST API community plugin running: Install and enable it in the settings and copy the api key.

Claude Desktop

On MacOS: ~/Library/Application\ Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json On Windows: %APPDATA%/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json Development/Unpublished Servers Configuration

 "mcpServers": {
 "mcp-obsidian": {
 "command": "uv",
 "args": [
 "--directory",
 "<dir_to>/mcp-obsidian",
 "run",
 "mcp-obsidian"

Published Servers Configuration

 "mcpServers": {
 "mcp-obsidian": {
 "command": "uvx",
 "args": [
 "mcp-obsidian"
 "env": {
 "OBSIDIAN_API_KEY" : "<YOUR_OBSIDIAN_API_KEY>"

Development

Building

To prepare the package for distribution:

Sync dependencies and update lockfile:

uv sync

Debugging

Since MCP servers run over stdio, debugging can be challenging. For the best debugging experience, we strongly recommend using the MCP Inspector. You can launch the MCP Inspector via npm with this command:

npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector uv --directory /path/to/mcp-obsidian run mcp-obsidian

Upon launching, the Inspector will display a URL that you can access in your browser to begin debugging. You can also watch the server logs with this command:

tail -n 20 -f ~/Library/Logs/Claude/mcp-server-mcp-obsidian.log

How to Use

To use the mcp-obsidian, follow these steps:

Visit https://github.com/MarkusPfundstein/mcp-obsidianhttps://github.com/Markus...
Follow the setup instructions to create an account (if required)
Connect the MCP server to your Claude Desktop application
Start using mcp-obsidian capabilities within your Claude conversations

Additional Information

Created

November 29, 2024

Company

MarkusPfundstein

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