Default Location for Attachments

Current options provided:

Obsidian provides the following options for storing the attachments:

  1. In vault folder (I guess in .obsidian)
  2. In folder specified below (which is my preference)
  3. In the same folder with note
  4. In subfolder at current note

Scenario not covered:

In my case I’m storing in a specified folder named aux, which puts all images or attachments in there.

However, I often come to the need of “breaking up” a vault, ie:

  • moving some folders with notes to another vault, as my notes keep getting bigger and bigger).

Problem:

  • If I use option 4, it would litter each folder that has attachments with an ‘aux’ file.
  • If I use option 3, it would litter each folder with the attachments direction.
  • Option 1 or 2 are cleaner, but moving a folder to another vault would cause missing images.

What I need

A problem could be solved if there’s is a specified folder name, with hierarchical semantics.

Example:

  • In the below example, if I place anything on Topic2, then it will be stored on that aux file.
  • If I place anything on Topic1, it will be placed on the root aux folder
  • So it hierarchically finds the closest aux folder, up until the root vault directory.
aux/
Topic1/
Topic1/Subtopic 2
Topic2/aux
Topic3/

Any other suggestions?

Has any of you had a similar problem?
If so, what approach did you use?

In my case, I’ll be creating a script to handle “vault chopping”…

.obsidian is reserved for settings files/themes/plugins/etc, so “vault folder” is just the root of your vault.

If you are doing this often, option 4 might be the best route.

I mostly keep my attachments in a single folder (option 2), but if I’m working on a project that might be split out or archived later, option 3/4 makes the most sense even if cluttered with attachments or, better, a sub-folder with them.

There’s a feature request here with some ideas and a few plugins to try that might make things smoother.

Related feature requests (upvote by pressing the heart or adding relevant new info):

https://forum.obsidian.md/t/create-subfolders-for-attachments-based-on-custom-pattern-e-g-note-file-name/34096

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