Asked to select vault on lauch each time and a java errors after some weird syncing

Hello, everyone. Obsidian has been acting a little weird since I added my iPad to the mix. Currently I’m syncing between my Windows PC, my Android phone and my iPad.

I am using the paid Obsidian syncing service.

The iPad, which had been removed from the circuit for a couple of months got re-added, and I noticed it didn’t sync properly with the online shared vault.

So then I went over to my PC and to save a back up before actually starting up Obsidian there (and thus triggering the sync process) and then when I did launch Obsidian I ended up with several errors (two JAVA errors) and spent like 2 hours trying to make them stop and make Obsidian function normally on my PC again.

(I believe one of the two errors was a simple re-indexing/cache rebuilding of the vault, the other was related to a plugin.)

What is happening right now, most of the time, is that every fresh launch of Obsidian requires me to select my vault instead of launching right into it.

I thought today I’d try re-indexing and not only did that not solve the problem, but it gave me one of the errors from yesterday again.

(The attatched error referring to a .asar file.)

I believe this error pertains to a plugin. I was able to get it to disappear by turning them all off and on, and I specifically think it’s the “Recent Files” plugin which does not actually begin to function properly until it is turned off and on post a re-indexing. After that, the JAVA error seems to go away.

Everything works, nonetheless at this point.

Both my iPad and my Phone are syncing and so is my PC but these weird errors and behaviors are still kinda weirding me out. This only happened a couple nights ago when I added my iPad back into the mix.

I also see lots of conflict files in my “.obsidian” folder and I don’t know what those are or what to do with them.

What I’m trying to do

I am trying to right now most of all just get my main vault to open every time like it used to.

(And maybe get some insight and info regarding those conflict files).

Things I have tried

  • Re-indexing vault.
  • Reinstalling Obsidian. (made sure to delete all files from %appdata% folder.
  • Previously, manually deleting the cache and .asar folders/files from the %appdata% folder and letting Obsidian rebuild them.

Related questions

  • Would it help to remove the actual synced vault completely and resync my vault?
  • What about all of those conflict files seen in the attachment below? Can I delete those or are they important?

As I am writing this again the .asar plugin issue game up again, and for one cycle Obsidian did not need me to select my vault. Now it is again asking me to select my vault. And the .asar error resolved itself this time without me needing to play around with any plugins.

What is happening?

Thanks to anyone who helps me out here.


Tt24-15

You might benefit from using an “Override config folder” for your iPad and assigning it to a name like .obsidian-ipad

Settings->Files and links->Override config folder

Pros:

  • configuration files are independent on iPad, so issues can be isolated
  • you can have different settings between devices.
  • reduce syncing conflicts because your .obsidian-ipad file would only be modified by one device.

Cons:

  • you have to repeat any changes to your settings for each device with it’s own “Override config folder”
  • your workspaces will be independent, so when you open Obsidian on the other device, you won’t have the same tabs open
  • plugin caches might have to duplicate effort

I use an .obsidian folder for my desktop and .obsidian-mobile for my phone. I like how this allows me to have different plugins between the devices and different settings like font sizes and table widths.

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Ok I’ll take a look into that. Most of this is new to me.

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A common issue that seems to repeat for Apple users is when their vaults are on iCloud. The way iCloud removes files and stores them remotely seems to cause issues with Sync, but take this with a grain of salt. I personally don’t use an Apple device, so my impression is second hand.

Yeah I was using a samsung galaxy tab and everything was working just fine until the iPad got involved.

But I also have no idea how all these files that are in the guts of Obsidian works right now so maybe some time in the future I’ll be able to figure it out.

Damn, I think I corrupted something bad. Now it prompts me to enable my community plugins on every startup.

I think I’m going to just delete the .obsidian folder and save my notes.

Like, I’ll create a new vault from scratch importing my old markdown notes and folders and I’ll just have to jot down all the plugins and settings I used for them.

I’ll have to delete the app on my phone and tablet too and then sync back up after I’m set up again on PC.

Sorry to hear. :cry: Good luck!

Definitely make a copy of your vault on your PC to a different directory before you start.

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Yep, I got it all up and running again.

backed up my notes, deleted my .obsidian config folder, uninstalled obsidian, deleted the appdata folders.

Then created a new vault, dragged in my notes, re-installed my old plugins and redid all the settings. (apparently I’m hearing now you can take the config file out of the .obsidian folder and paste it into your new vault and that your old settings will be preserved.)

Anywhoo up and running on all 3 devices.

Guess everything just needed a good cleanin’

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Did you decide to go with a unique .obsidian-ipad directory for your iPad? That might help avoid the same thing from happening again.

You can copy your existing .obsidian directory and name the copy .obsidian-ipad. Then change the "Override config folder” on just your iPad to point to the new .obsidian-ipad folder.

Yeah I’m definitely thinking about doing that since sometimes I guess you’d want different settings on different devices.

So many of those conflicts were on mobile so it could have definitely contributed, maybe some plugins and settings were weirding out between PC and mobile, like they didn’t play nice.

Conflicts arise when two different devices have changed the same file in different ways and obsidian doesn’t know which change to accept.

I’m assuming your iPad made changes to files in your .obsidian directory, but those changes weren’t picked up right away by Sync. Then you opened your vault on a different device which made different changes on the same files in your .obsidian directory. Then, when you went back to your iPad, the original changes from your iPad were finally recognized by Sync, but now Sync was confused because it didn’t know which change to use.

By having an .obsidian-ipad directory, hopefully this would avoid causing the conflicts in the first place since your different devices would be modifying separate config files.

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Yup that’s a great way to put it and it sounds like the right thing to do. I’ll go an do that so hopefully this gets avoided in the future.

I guess one final note for anyone who might happen to peak in. I might start another topic or ask on reddit some time in the future if this continues to happen simply because I’d like to get to the bottom of it:

Whenever I open Obsidian on the PC, it always makes me select my vault manually. The vault manager opens up instead of opening the last vault by default.

That’s it though, no other strange behavior and all my notes are syncing properly on all my devices.

It’s just odd to me that totally removing and reinstalling (including deleting and resyncing a vault) did not solve this.

I think I’ve figured out what is causing Obsidian to re-prompt me for which vault to open.

Because I use several monitors, I keep a weekly note among other things always viewable in a smaller side monitor. I noticed that if I close that extra window, so that only a single window of my Obsidian vault is open, and then I close that singular remaining window, the next time Obsidian opens it opens instantly to that vault and there is no vault manager requesting me to choose.

It seems that if I keep my Obsidian vault opened in a multi windowed state, it triggers the vault manager every time I start up Obsidian.

I am able to reproduce this again and again.