Making Obsidian play nice with Logseq

Thanks for the tips.

I have used Obsidian for the past two years and find it an excellent tool. Logseq’s block referencing and its ability to update blocks (in real time while they are being viewed), I find very powerful for my Zettelkasten.

I have found a few portability issues though

1. Block references don’t play well in Obsidian

I use block references heavily and Obsidian does not recognise them so, for example it will display a block reference as ((1e514c8c-a6d4-4589-8369-91c68b6e805b)) in the Obsidian Editor.

So until Obsidian can render logseq block references correctly I would only use Logseq (Desktop or Mobile) to view Logseq graphs (vaults). If you don’t use block references and only page links then Obsidian does a pretty good job of rendering Logseq pages

2. Page embeds show the {{ embed and }}

But the Page Links in the page embed do work

3. Logbook blocks are displayed

For example, Obsidian shows

:LOGBOOK:
  CLOCK: [2022-02-22 Tue 20:23:43]
  CLOCK: [2022-02-22 Tue 20:36:19]
  :END:

rather than suppressing it on the Obsidian Preview mode

4. QUERIES do not work

No surprise here

There is an obsidian plugin which I am closely monitoring at https://github.com/ruivieira/obsidian-plugin-logseq which is starting to develop logseq compatibility within Obsidian. Over time this could be a very useful plugin.

Cheers
Allan @ adxsoft

6 Likes

This is great!

What is the purposes of the ‘Tasks’ step where you create a page called [[logseq tasks]]? I don’t quite follow why we need to do this.

This is a way to find Logseq tasks in Obsidian. I no longer use this workflow since there is now a Logseq mobile app.

Thanks for the reply, I just downloaded the logseq app which is great! So won’t need this either. May be worth editing the original post so other users are aware of the app.

I have the same problem.How did you solve it? Change the cdn setting back?

Same here. I didnt get what was that query for. I am using tasks plug-in in ob at the moment. Unsurprisingly, it doesnt work with logseq

I finally figured out one of the display issues I had when Obsidian read my Logseq files. The way indents and spaces are handled differently was causing ugly displays in Obsidian. I couldn’t figure out why I wasn’t getting the standard bullets and only seeing dashes. That kept me from really using Obsidian. I fixed my template and now they look just as nice in Obsidian as they do in Logseq. This may have been obvious, but I couldn’t figure it out.

I have a daily notes template that looks like this:

  template:: daily-journal-template
  template-including-parent:: false
	- #### General & Planning
		- What do I want to get accomplished today and this week?
		  collapsed:: true
	- #### Meetings
		- Meetings for today
	- #### Tasks
		-

So I changed to this:

## Daily Notes

#### General & Planning
   - What do I want to get accomplished today and this week?

### Meetings
   - Meetings for today	

### Tasks
   -

Note that those leading spaces are actually tabs. So changing them to 3 spaces instead of tabs makes both programs display them correctly with bullet points not dashes.

I hope this helps someone else that missed this feature.

3 Likes

Obsidian should ignore the logseq folder:
Files & Links > Excluded Files > Manage > select the logseq folder

1 Like

I am a long time outliner too. My longest an most successful experience was with MaxThink starting in mid-80’s till Windows replaced MS-DOS. Next best was Vim with Vimwiki.

I’ve barely gotten started with Obsidian. I’ve made slow progress using custom alphanumeric with alphabetic text for file names. Put off by the cumbersomeness of this. With long experience it might become intuitive but it will have to be long. As it is it slows down my note taking considerably; and makes it become less intuitive.

I just discovered Logseq this past weekend. I have the iOS app and envision using it primarily with it. I would love it if I could organize and access the files in my Obsidian vault with Logseq. I see the configuration adjustments to Obsidian settings.

How do I access my Obsidian vault from Logseq? Might I be able to do so from the desktop app as well as the iOS app?

2 Likes

Has anyone been able to get Namespaced (Hierarchy) work well between Obsidian and Logseq? The issue I am facing is that if I create a link to

In Obsidian, if I use a link to [[Parent/Child]], it will create a subfolder named Parent and a file called Child.md within it. This happens regardless of whether the page was already created in Logseq or not. It is not using the Logseq naming convention of Parent__Child.md

I much prefer the way I can find my content within Obsidian compared to the Logseq search functionality. It also makes edits easier… unless I need to create Namespaced links :slight_smile:

2 Likes

Using the same files for Logseq and Obsidian is taking a risk of file corruption.

2 separate sets of files in 2 separate vaults will not cause corruption, but it is also not the idea behind Making Obsidian play nice with Logseq.

The idea is to give Logseq access to the files in Obsidian’s vault, and that is where the risk comes in as the 2 apps do not treat the files the same way…

I have been using Logseq; but I am being forced to try working with Obsidian simply because local file links don’t work properly in Logseq (on MX Linux) except for on the root partition. (I opened a bug report here: Local file link doesn't work except on home/root partition (MX linux)).
Also while browsing the Logseq bug reports; I found way too many reports of data loss. And in both cases very little in the way of direct response from Logseq devs (as far as I can tell).
I generally prefer the way that Logseq is designed from a use standpoint; but these 2 things are kind of show stoppers for me. It’s a bit of a shame as I would much prefer just to use Logseq.

For now, trying Obsidian with plugins…using both…but yeah; it’s not ideal.

2 Likes

Should these entries into config.edn be in curly brackets {…} or not ?
Many thanks

Nope, just do them as shown.

1 Like

If the ignores are in place (hidden in Loqseq), having Logseq and Obsidian in the same directory is fine. Problems arise in reformatting, inconsistent linking, and slow if both applications are open.

I use Logseq for daily journaling, idea capture, and outlining. My dailies live in journals, and New pages are created in pages. That’s consistent between Logseq and Obsidian.

There are times when I have both applications open. In that case, I open journals and taxonomy in Logseq and long-form content in Obsidian. Because both constantly look for file changes, I’m careful about bulk changes and renaming.

The ability to write cross-references in a basic Markdown would make things run faster. To be application-aware or able to have compatibility settings. Both have their place in my writing workflow. Some work better on certain devices too.

For the long form, I use Typora, and recently I added Claude Sonnet 3.5 (better than other LLMs for this use case) to parse the markdown into proper Logseq indenting.