Turn off new YAML 1.4?

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

I am trying to revert back to previous YAML view. The current view (1.4) negates all the tags that I have. They don’t show up at all. I don’t want to have to reenter them all.

Things I have tried

I have attempted to read through documentation, did a search via google, looked at switches under Core Plugins and haven’t been able to find a way to do this. Thanks for the help. Apologies if this is a simple fix that I missed.

3 Likes

Perhaps a workaround would be to switch to Source mode. E.g. CMD+P > “Toggle Live Preview/Source mode”.

1 Like

I have been using the #Tag (example #Personal) protocol for some time. It is pretty standard with other apps. I can no longer do that in this iteration, even switching to Source Mode. If I enter #Personal, Obsidian indicates that it is not a valid entry for a Tag and will delete it. I have been a big fan of Obsidian and even did the paid version (moving from Evernote). But this has kind of broken it for me. I often use a text editor app and save to .md and then move file into Obsidian vault. This isn’t good.

2 Likes

Well… why not add an option to disable the feature? I don’t see why everyone would want to have it. Plus I don’t want to disable live preview just to not have this feature.

6 Likes

It’s unclear what’s happening at the moment. Check the BR and FR categories or Discord.

Where exactly do you key in #Personal? In the frontmatter (YAML) section as the value of the tags key or as an inline (Dataview) YAML key, e.g., tags:: #Personal?

We need to know where and when the issue breaks your workflow.

I think they want to revert to live preview pre v1.4.x YAML/frontmatter/metadata display. Or maybe not?

@ariehen Obsidian settings:

  • Use YAML frontmatter instead of property — on/off.

Easy as that.

It is in the YAML section - in between the three dashes.


Tags: #Personal


If switch to Source mode, the checkboxes don’t work.

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In YAML headers, tags don’t use the hash (#) symbol.

So a syntax mismatch?

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Which is where exactly? I have turned off Properties. I did a search for this and can’t find it.

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Well, it used to work - and when importing notes from other apps, it was really helpful to not have to edit them. And Tags - Obsidian Help does show hashtags at the bottom of the page being used.

Haven’t used 1.4.x but believe it is set up to nurture metadata integrity.

And, yes, hashes can be used in the body of notes. They aren’t meant to be used in YAML headers.

If it helps, the hash is used in YAML to denote a comment:

1 Like

If you’re saying your layout is like the following:

---
Tags: #Personal
---

Then you actually have invalid YAML. The # character denotes a comment, so none of the tags for your notes are actually applied.

4 Likes

Of course you don’t find it, they have not implemented that option.
Mine was just a suggestion for the developers, sorry to illude you :sweat_smile:

Tags in Properties (and, therefore in YAML) do not require the hashmark. Just use

tags: Personal

Thanks for the help. Will drop the hashtag going forward. However, Evernote export (using Evernote export, and Obsidian Evernote plugin) uses the hashtag in the YAML section. So apparently it is somewhat standard procedure.

Got it - apologies. Good idea though.

1 Like

Hello.

Don’t know about Evernote.

Hashes are allowed in YAML as comment indicators. In the image below, you can see that #hash in the YAML is not recognized as a tag (because it is a comment), so it is not read in queries (see the example q1 hash). The #yesahash tag in the body can be queried.

---
date: 2023-08-03
tags: nohash, #hash, 
# End of sample YAML
---

#yesahash

# q1 nohash

```dataview 
Table
FROM #nohash
Where file.name = this.file.name
```

# q1 hash

```dataview 
Table
FROM #hash
Where file.name = this.file.name
```

# q1 yesahash

```dataview 
Table
FROM #yesahash
Where file.name = this.file.name
```
3 Likes

Thanks for the explanation - appreciated.

1 Like