blip-capture-plugin.zip (5.5 KB)
I made this with Claude Opus 4.5 after hearing Casey Newton from Platformer and Hard Fork fame talk about how he captures fleeting thoughts which he calls Blips. This plugin only implements the capture aspect, not the “random surfacing” aspect because I personally don’t want a bunch of pop-ups within Obsidian. Rather, I look at my Blips every day. The plugin is easy to install (see below) and works to my specs perfectly. The attached zip file has the files needed and a readme with instructions which are also provided below.
Here is a prompt pieced together from 3 iterations of prompts that I used for Claude Opus 4.5 to generate the plugin:
Would you please write a plugin for Obsidian Notes that allows me to use a hotkey or link from the Ribbon to get a small rectangular pop-up window in which I can type a bit of information that we’ll call a Blip and save that Blip to a file in the root directory called Blips. So the pop-up window would have a button that says Save and when that is clicked the Blip is sent to the top of a text file and proceeded by the creation date of the Blip. Make the font in the Blip window 14pt. Add a mechanism to easily delete a Blip from the Blips file and reorganize the Blips then add this mechanism to the Ribbon with a different icon than the one use for Blip Capture. When the Blip is written to the Blips file put a blank line above the Blip and always keep a blank line as the first line in the Blips file.
Here is the Readme file in the zip.
Blip Capture Plugin for Obsidian
Quickly capture short notes (“Blips”) via a hotkey or ribbon button and save them to a central Blips.md file in your vault’s root directory.
Features
• Ribbon Icon: Click the 
(zap) icon in the left sidebar to open the Blip capture modal
• Hotkey Support: Assign custom hotkeys for capturing and managing blips
• Timestamped Entries: Each blip is automatically prepended with its creation date and time
• Newest First: New blips are added to the top of the file
• Manage Blips: View and delete blips via a dedicated management modal
• Keyboard Shortcuts:
– Ctrl/Cmd + Enter to save
– Escape to cancel
Installation
Manual Installation
1. Create a folder called blip-capture in your vault’s .obsidian/plugins/ directory
2. Copy these three files into that folder:
– main.js
– manifest.json
– styles.css
3. Reload Obsidian (or close and reopen it)
4. Go to Settings → Community plugins → Enable “Blip Capture”
Setting Hotkeys
1. Go to Settings → Hotkeys
2. Search for “Blip” to find both commands:
– Capture a new Blip - opens the capture modal
– Manage Blips (view and delete) - opens the management modal
3. Click the + button and assign your desired key combinations
Usage
Capturing a Blip
1. Click the icon in the ribbon OR use your assigned hotkey
2. Type your blip in the text area
3. Click “Save” or press Ctrl/Cmd + Enter
4. Your blip will be saved to Blips.md in your vault’s root directory
Deleting a Blip
1. Open the Command Palette (Ctrl/Cmd + P)
2. Search for “Manage Blips” and select it
3. Click the × button next to any blip to delete it
Manage Blips ribbon icon — Now appears as a list icon (☰) next to the capture icon
Drag and drop reordering — Each blip has a drag handle (⋮⋮) on the left. Drag any blip and drop it onto another to swap positions. The new order is saved automatically to the file.
Output Format
Each blip is saved with a timestamp, separated by blank lines:
markdown
**Sunday, February 2, 2026 at 10:30 AM**
Your blip content here
**Sunday, February 2, 2026 at 09:15 AM**
An earlier blip
Files
• main.js - The compiled plugin code
• manifest.json - Plugin metadata
• styles.css - Modal styling (11pt font size)
Development
If you want to modify the plugin:
1. Clone the source files
2. Run npm install
3. Run npm run dev for development (watches for changes)
4. Run npm run build for production build