Ive been reading about nested vaults wich accomplish a lot of what i want but arent supported and have their own issues; most of what i saw suggests/requests support for then but i think its the wrong way to tackle it (and involves a lot more of headache for coding, memory and such). Heres a different proposal:
Use case or problem
Handling specific contexts that are too large inside an large and growing main vault- like specific projects- creates a lot of noise; Creating another vault is an way, but isolates then entirely, and nesting vaults allow their coexistance on a macro level but have traps and bugs
Proposed solution: Zones/Filtering
The best solution i can imagine is allowing this type of division within a vault itself- not by making obsidian treat folders as vaults, but by allowing vaults to have larger contexts that can be easily focused - cleaning up the interface, links and graph automatically for ease of use.
calling then Zones for now for clarity, but other names could apply (areas, levels, macro-filters, idk)
A zone would work as a form of tag, where any notes/files could be assigned to it.
Along then a view/toggle called Focused View would filter an vault by zone:
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Focused View: clicking or double clicking a Zone would filter out anything but what pertains to a zone. A collored ribbon could appear on top of the window written Focused View: [Zone Name] with an X button for closing the focused view, returning to normal
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Folder as Zone: right clicking a folder to create a zone quickly, automatically assigning everything thats put into it as pertaining to that zone- and unsassigng everything removed from it.
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Expansion Level: a setting (perhaps a dragabble bar in the suggested ribbon on top of the window) would expand how much focused the view is; On 0(or 1) it shows only whats assigned as a Zone (in a folder-as-zone as well as tagged-to-zone); Increasing it one level would show notes/files that are directly linked to whats in the zone but arent assigned to it thenselves, increasing it more would show links from those notes and so on (but by that point it would defeat the purpose)
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Additional Features: views/workspaces and perhaps even themes, plugins and settings could be assigned to zones. For example opening a zone setting would show the same setting windows but with every option like it is on default (and labeled as default), toggling then differently would customize the focused view for that zone alone.
At first i tought of suggesting just some ease of use filtering, but the more i tought about it the less tags made sense. If done by tags it would require to assign every note for separation (without ease of use of dropping in bulk on a folder), folder-as-zones would replicate many of the usecases people have for nested vaults (hosting, using with other apps) - plus being open for additional features in the future, like customizing their view
Ui/Ux suggestions:
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Zones tab: just like file explorer, starred and search, an tab for zones.
upon clicking it shows all files per zone, zones appearing as folds(>) like folders; Every vault would have 1 default zone called master/root/macro/full (or No-Zone) -
zone pill: if a note is assigned to a zone the zone name appears on the file like a collored tag- or on the title bar; Clicking on it would open the focused view to that zone.
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context menu, folders: option to turn a folder into a zone (folder-as-zone)
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Colored folders(zones): on the file explorer folders who are treated as zones have a distinct color or icon alongside then
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ribbon: way of showing users the vault is being filtered/focused in a zone; button for closing and settings if applicable.
Alternative: Focused View for Folders
Disregard zones- would be implementing such focused view for folders, any folder as is. No need to have a special name for zones, focusing would be achievable by right clicking on a folder to focus, much simpler.
However i personally think being able to tag files in different folders as also being a zone would be much more flexible and usable