Symlink: consistent behaviour depending on file type

Steps to reproduce

I integrate pdfs, images an other ressources into my vault by using symlinks: The original file remains outside the vault, the symlink is placed within and can be accessed in obsidian.

Expected result

Click on Symlink should open the file as if the original was present; either natively in obsidian or using the default app, depending on the original file type.

Actual result

Left click on symlink of:

  • pdf: opens file natively as expected
  • jpg: shows the image as broken; but a right click on symlink and “open in default app” works
  • mp4: shows only a small and inactive player window; but a right click on symlink and “open in default app” works

Environment

  • Operating system: Windows10
  • Obsidian version: 0.11.13

Additional information

Symlinks are created per file with "link shell extension"

Hi. we don’t officially support file symlinks.
Please, open a feature request.

https://help.obsidian.md/Advanced+topics/How+Obsidian+stores+data#Symbolic+Links

Thank you! Maybe I misunderstood you. Here you wrote that symlinks are now supported:

Folder symlinks are supported

Good hint, I will try this

Actually, Symlinks aren’t fully supported. There appear to be restrictions about symlinks pointing elsewhere in the same vault.

I understand this can lead to circular situations, but I want to make a case for it:

I’m trying to organize a vault that’s shared via OneDrive to SharePoint. The problem is that if I do a link like then within SharePoint, this thing becomes something like /Forms/Images/image.png - which of course does not exist. Mind you, synchronizing that Vault with another machine works fine on that machine. The only thing that really breaks is previewing markdown files within the sharepoint web frontend itself.

Which is annoying as we want to share our vault on SharePoint so that we can manage the content via Obsidian, but have other people look at it in SharePoint (e.g., from our project management software, we can put hyperlinks to attached notes that are managed in sharepoint).

Now, what I’ve noticed after some trial and error is that if I prefix the Obsidian Link with “…/” (two dots and a slash, so to go one level up), it suddenly points to the root of my sharepoint site, so e.g., becomes /Shared%20Documents/Images/image.png. So there’s just like a one folder level difference if I ultimately compensate for the folder structure.

I’ve like

test6

which translates in SharePoint to

/Shared%20Documents/04%20-%20Data/Documentation/Data%20Calculation/Images/test.png

and previews just fine in SharePoint.

But of course, I don’t see now the image in Obsidian.

This is where symlinks come in. I can compensate for the difference in folder hierarchy by a symlink.

Once I’ve done that, I can e.g. see just fine the image if I use some other MarkDown editor.

Just not in Obsidian. Whatever I try I just cannot make that symlink visible in Obsidian; other Symlinks outside Obsidian Vault work well, but of course, creating a symlink out via another symlink also doesn’t work.

It sounds awefully complicated for such a simple thing.

So that’s why my request: could we possibly have this “no symlink if inside the vault” feature be disabled as a user option?

Thanks!