How can I make obsidian play a video in the default app when clicking on the link?

Help
1

First, search the help docs and this forum. Maybe your question has been answered! The debugging steps can help, too. Still stuck? Delete this line and proceed.

What I’m trying to do

The default preview mode of obsidian shows the first frame of the video, which is an ugly black or white rectangle. Instead I want to use an arbitrary image as starter for video.
Now I can start a video in the default app with right-click → context menu: :arrow_upper_right: Open in default app →left-click.
The syntax for an arbitrary preview image as video starter:
![[Spiegelei_braten_video-title.jpg|300]]

Spiegelei_braten_video-title
Spiegelei_braten_video-title929×646 76.5 KB

Can the behaviour of Obsidian be changed, so that a single left click on the link to an video can start playing it in the default video player app, e.g. SMPlayer or VLC?

Things I have tried

I just searched the current obsidian help. I went through the settings of obsidian. I tried some Markdown syntax.

2

Use a file:// link:

file://c:/path/to/your/file.mp4

or if you want a styled link:

[Your link text](file://c:/path/to/your/file.mp4)
3

Is it an absolute path?

4

Correction for the syntax of my video starter image, as it was incomplete:
With adjustment of the image size:

[![[Spiegelei_braten_video-title.jpg|300]]](<Das_perfekte_Spiegelei.webm>)

Here all files are located in the same folder.
It should also work with relative paths to the linked files.

5

Did you try with a file:// url? That will open in your default player rather than inside Obsidian. You’ll need to test whether relative or absolute links are required by your OS.

Can the behaviour of Obsidian be changed, so that a single left click on the link to an video can start playing it in the default video player app, e.g. SMPlayer or VLC?

Yes, just use a file:// url.

6

On my desktop (Linux) this suggestion doesn’t work at all. Besides I don’t want to rebuild manually all relative links as absolute links. :slightly_frowning_face:

7

That’s strange, it works perfectly for me in Linux - the file opens immediately in VLC.

vmware_4ZWRsIPjWm

If you don’t want to change your links, perhaps there is a plugin which can force items to open externally? But changing all links should be fairly easy doing a global regex search and replace in an external text editor (or even via JS/Python/Bash script.

8

I found when I set up links like that:

[Impress_Basics](<file:///mnt/aethon/EDV/Computech_obv/LibreOffice/Impress/assets/BM1_Impress Grundlagen HD - YouTube [720p].mp4>)

[The_change_of_borders_in_Europe](file:///home/bartolo/Videos/Die_Grenzen_Europas.webm)

the videos are playing immediately in SMPlayer on one click.
But as I use my vaults on more than one computer, I can’t use absolute links.

My programming skills don’t go beyond copy-paste, so a regex search and a script are not an option for me.
I would rather prefer a hack in the settings or a plugin, that forces to open links (to videos) externally.