Windows Taskbar Recent List of Vaults

Feature requests
1

I like that Typora and many other document-oriented apps show a list of recent files on windows when you right-click the icon in the taskbar. That makes it really easy to browse and open projects without having to open the app and use its main interface to find the project and open it.

Here’s an example.

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I wouldn’t want to see individual markdown files in this recent list, but rather the recent vaults that I’ve used.

I don’t think this functionality can be accomplished in a plugin, so I’m filing it as a feature request.

16 Likes
2

I am all for this. See Onenote, which shows all recent notebooks.
One difference is that there is no way to open a new Onenote window and a recent notebook simultaneously, ie, clicking the “Schedule” notebook in this menu switches focus to the most recently open window, then overrides whatever was already open. This is slightly irritating, as it often defeats the purpose of the recent notebooks menu.

1 Like
3

So I kind of got this working, manually at least.

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Steps

  1. Copy the path to your vault: C:\Users\arcan\Dropbox\Gaming\Ultimate System\Holy War\Holy War
  2. Create a shortcut (on your desktop or somewhere) by going to Right Click > New Shortcut
  3. Type the new obsidian file protocol and paste your path obsidian:///C:\Users\arcan\Dropbox\Gaming\Ultimate System\Holy War\Holy War
  4. Drag your new shortcut to the taskbar. It should say Pin to Obsidian.
  5. You should now see that shortcut in the Jump List for Obsidian.

I do still wish that these would be added automatically from my Recent Vaults list though.

6 Likes
4

is it possible/easy to implement jump list items in windows taskbar? would love to right-click on the obsidian icon and have a list of my frequent vaults to quickly choose from. i know this is a random thing probably far down the list of priorities, but i can dream, right?

5 Likes
5

Agreed. See also this request:

1 Like
6

I figured out a temporary manual way:

1 Like
7

Thanks for sharing. Works well, beneficial to win10 users for being able to skip the Vault button at all.

You have also helped me discover more on Obsidian:///. Two things. Use the scheme with folder not limited to files only. And with files, without even specifying .md.

8

You are awesome! This works perfectly. Thank you!

9

Another thing I’ve discovered is that it won’t work if you have spaces in your folder path unless you replace spaces with %20

example: path name/folder name becomes path%20name/folder%20name

10

I second this request. The feature is officially called “JumpList” and has an Electron API.

Some things that could go onto the JumpList:

  • Recently opened vaults (this is the most important one)
  • Recently opened documents
  • Starred documents
  • Open daily note

For the time being, @arcandio’s solution is a great workaround. You can actually add any page in Obsidian to the JumpList. Just use the “Copy Obsidian URL” command in Obsidian, and paste this to the dialog when you create the Windows shortcut. Then drag that shortcut to the taskbar.

2 Likes
11

Another +1 for this request! :slight_smile: I came to (and signed up to) the forum explicitly just to request this - and then saw that it had already been requested quite a few times. Good to see that there’s a manual workaround for now though! Thanks @arcandio! :slight_smile:

12

Unfortunately this no longer works on Windows 11. It now shows a :no_entry_sign: when you try to drag the shortcut to the taskbar and I haven’t found any workarounds.

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Please add this as a feature to Obsidian, it would be a huge time saver! :pray:

2 Likes
13

Also +1 for the Feature request. I’m working with 3 different vaults and it would be a huge improvement to start directly in the specific vault and not land in the wrong vault and then go to the desired vault.
I expect the behaviour to be right click on taskbar icon, then all my vaults are listed and I can select the right one (maybe also most recent vaults but I only have 3 and it won’t be more than 10 in the far far future for me.

1 Like
14

As I’m building out my Obsidian workflow, I’m finding it much easier to keep projects separated into their own vaults. Having to open last vault I was working on, then swap, then close the first one is a bit of a pain.

+1 from me as well.

15

I was using the previous Windows work-around using shortcuts, and I was pretty happy with it. It wasn’t built-in but it worked. Then Windows 11 happened and now I’m always playing “no, the other vault” every time I open Obsidian. I’d really appreciate if jump lists were an official thing. I use multiple vaults across multiple projects, as well as my main “Me” vault, and constantly having to open the vault picker to go track down the one I really wanted is pretty irritating. I know there are worse problems in the world, but there is a standardized approach to how this should be presented in Windows, and it works really well. Please implement jump list functionality.

2 Likes
16

i agree. still haven’t found a satisfying method, but this is what is working for me now:

created shortcuts on my desktop that open the default landing page of each vault. obsidian://open/?vault=stuff&file=_scratchpad

icons on my desktop are hidden so i don’t actually see them. added the shortcuts to my start menu so they are just a click away. swapped out thumbnails so each vault has its own identity.

17

I’d love to see this implemented, it would make working with multiple vaults quicker.

18

I can confirm that arcadio’s workaround (creating shortcuts to the obsidian:// URL of the vaults and dragging them onto the pinned Obsidian icon in the taskbar) does not work any more with Windows 11. At least not for adding new links - the old links that I created under Windows 10 are still there after upgrading to Windows 11. Another example of things that Microsoft disimproved in Windows 11.