Getting started with plugins

Getting started

Download VS Code
Set up Node.js and NPM
Looking at simple plugin and cloning it
- Open your terminal
- Open the folder for the newly-downloaded plugin in the terminal
- Run npm i in the plugin folder
- Run npm run dev and the terminal will re-compile whenever the .ts file has changes saved

Open up the plugin’s folder in VS Code
Open the file main.ts and start changing things
Refer to the Obsidian API 10 to understand what you can use
- Hover API elements
Use console.log(object) or console.log(variable) to check the state/functioning of your plugin (see debugging below)
Drag the newly-created main.js and manifest.json files from the plugin folder into Your-Vault/.obsidian/plugins/Some-Plugin-Folder
(If loading the plugin for the first time, reload—or quit and relaunch—Obsidian)
(Unload and re)load the plugin in Obsidian’s Preferences → Community Plugins → the appropriate plugin toggle
Test it by invoking the features you’ve played with
Debug by using the Console tab in Obsidian’s Developer Tools (open dev tools with cmd/ctrl+shift+i, then select the console tab)

Install VS Code
Create a new Obsidian test vault
Clone obsidianmd/obsidian-sample-plugin as a template
Init a new git repo (Initialise a git repo) at test-vault/.obsidian/plugins/ and pull the created repo in the step before
Install npm and NodeJS – I did via homebrew.
Run npm i (I also needed to run sudo npm install -g npm to update npm )
Run npm run dev and the terminal will re-compile whenever the .ts file has changes saved
Make some changes in main.ts (eg. change console.log('loading plugin') to console.log('loading my awesome plugin')
Changes should automatically compile into main.js

Reload Obsidian to load the new version of your plugin.
Enable plugin in settings window.
For updates to the Obsidian API run npm update in the command line under your repo folder.
Change manifest.json and versions.json