Hi! New and trying to get a good setup across my devices (was apple notes and OneNote) and have subscribed to ObsidianSync too. I’m wanting to use it to consolidate all my uni work, and want to put all my docs, images, lectures, pdfs, videos, recordings, etc in the vault (which will be huge) and probably exceed the limits quickly… let alone if I also want to use it personally or for work.
What I’m realising now is that it needs the entire vault to be fully downloaded on every device all the time to work, I would prefer on demand to optimise space as this will be huge.
Alternatively was thinking I could keep all the assets (docs, pdfs, videos, recordings) in my Documents folder in iCloud and just link or embed them, but the external links to iCloud are different on Mac and iOS and my ObsidianSync remote vault is also in different location.
Now I’m thinking I might need to remove ObsidianSync, use the iCloud sync with Obsidian Vault in my Documents folder for just notes and set that vault to “Stay Downloaded” on all devices, and then try to set relative links to the media etc files outside the vault but in my iCloud documents folder.
That way the Vault will sync but just mostly notes so not really an issue being 100% downloaded on all devices, and can have links to files outside the vault on my iCloud that work everywhere and with terabytes of storage.
Is that possible, is there a better way, or am I a bit of a lost cause on this?
I’ve moved your question into its own thread because it was off topic for the thread you asked it in. If you want a different title and can’t edit it, let me know and I can change it for you.
How to handle large amounts of files/data across devices (on demand not fully downloaded) using ObsidianSync and/or iCloud inside or external to the vault
I renamed the topic, “How to handle and sync large amount of attachments?” I think that captures it. No need to fit the whole thread in the title.
May I ask what year of university you are in? Do you actually know you’ll benefit from storing all this data in this way, or are you trying to plan ahead?
Because the simplest answer is just don’t worry about storing it all. I think it would be much more valuable to store the notes, papers, and documents you distill from your classes, rather than attempting to store all your raw lectures and recordings.
I’d keep those in a separate file structure, where they can rest, forgotten and unwatched in peace.
If you have a few years experience in university and already know you’ll benefit from this, and actually rewatch some of this material, and actually link up your notes to those resources, then feel free to ignore me!
Thanks, Rig! Yes studying my MBA now, and have other course matieral I want to digitse the notes and link back to the source material on file for context and posterity.
I think a seperate file structure is prob best too, which I have in my iCloud, but I still want to link the notes to the PDFs and various media etc so I don’t need to hunt them down seperately, if that makes sense?
Not necessarily an index system (although that sounds good thinking about it now too), but contextual linking and embedding of data outside the vault.
Now if I do this using Documents on iCloud, great, but the links are absolute and contextual to the device filesystem. i.e. On Mac is like: [link text](<file:///Users/yul/Documents/_Uni/Course/Subject/File.ext>)
But that won’t work on iOS, different obv.
Unless there is some way to relative-reference iCloud that works across devices?
I want the data on-demand for my mobile devices basically, which I guess means has to be outside the Vault (unless there is a way to use Obsidian with on-demand data if running on a cloud somewhere?).
Appreciate all the ideas.
NB. Maybe is there a way to keep ALL NOTE ATTACHMENTS by default outside the Vault (on iCloud but with a relative reference that works on all Apple devices) so ObsidianSync won’t have to download them all (i.e. just notes, settings, etc in the Vault)?
I would put the filename in my note (and avoid changing it) so I could copy it and paste it into Spotlight. Or it would be possible to make a shortcut in Shortcuts that would take a file name and open or search it, and trigger it using the Shortcuts Launcher plugin.
Another alternative is the app DevonThink, but I don’t have any experience with it.
