CLI: create with path= fails when parent folder doesn't exist

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In the sandbox vault (restricted mode on, no community plugins, no snippets, default theme):

obsidian vault="Obsidian Sandbox" create path="new-folder/My Note" silent

Did you follow the troubleshooting guide? Y — reproduced in the sandbox vault with restricted mode on.

Expected result

The file new-folder/My Note.md is created, with the intermediate folder new-folder/ created automatically.

Actual result

Error: ENOENT: no such file or directory, open '/.../Obsidian Sandbox/new-folder/My Note.md'

The command fails because the parent directory doesn’t exist on disk.

Notes:

  • create path="My Note" silent (no subdirectory) works fine
  • create path="Guides/My Note" silent (existing folder) works fine
  • Only fails when path= references a folder that doesn’t yet exist

Environment

Obsidian version: 1.12.1
Installer version: 1.11.7
Operating system: macOS (Darwin 25.2.0)
Restricted mode: on
Custom theme: none (default)
Community plugins: none
CSS snippets: none

Additional information

The workaround is to mkdir -p the parent directory on disk before calling create. Obsidian picks up the new folder and file immediately.

This came up while using the CLI to scaffold a vault structure with ~20 files across nested folders. Since path= explicitly accepts folder separators (and the help text shows path=<path>), it’s reasonable to expect intermediate directories to be created — similar to how most file-creation tools behave.

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2

thanks

3

will be fixed 1.12.2. ETA unknown

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