Obsidian Contacts NextGen Plugin

Originally based off of Obsidian Contacts Plugin by Vadim Beskrovnov, this plugin for Obsidian allows you to easily organize and manage your contacts. Simply create a note with contact information and use the plugin's features to quickly search and sort through your contacts. The Contacts NextGen plugin also helps you to remember birthdays of your contacts, and keeps track of the last time you met with them!

Edit Mode

View Mode

Installation

Automatic

Disable Safe Mode in Obsidian to be able to install community plugins:

1. Go to the Settings menu and select Community Plugins.
2. In the Community Plugins menu, disable Safe Mode.

Install and enable Contacts NextGen plugin:

1. From the Community Plugins menu, click on Browse.
2. Search for the Contacts NextGen plugin.
3. Click the Install button to add the plugin.
4. In the Community Plugins menu, enable the Contacts NextGen plugin.

Manual

1. Download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest release.
2. Create a directory obsidian-contacts in your Obsidian vault plugins directory: <VaultFolder>/.obsidian/plugins/. The final path should be <VaultFolder>/.obsidian/plugins/obsidian-contacts-ng.
3. Move the downloaded files (main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css) into the newly created directory.(<VaultFolder>/.obsidian/plugins/obsidian-contacts-ng)
4. Restart Obsidian app.
5. Enable Contacts NextGen plugin in the Community Plugins settings tab.

Usage

After enabling the plugin in the settings menu, you should see the contacts button appear in the left sidebar. Click it to open the Contacts view in the right sidebar.

The plugin reads your contacts folder, which can be changed in the settings, to render all your contacts in the right sidebar.

Changing the Contacts Folder

1. Go to the Settings.
2. Find the "Contacts NextGen" tab.
3. Change the value of "Contacts Folder Location" to an existing folder.

Creating a New Contact

1. Click the "Contacts" icon in the left sidebar. The Contacts view should be opened in the right sidebar.
2. Click the "Create" button in the opened Contacts view in the right sidebar.
3. Fill out the created template. See an example below:

---
name:
  first: Scott
  last: Johnson
phone: +1 555 877 2612
email: [email protected]
linkedin: linkedin.com/in/jwir3
birthday: 1983-07-20
last_contact: 2022-12-06
friends: "[[Bob]] [[Sue]]"
tags: "#contacts"
type: contact
---

Feel free to add more rows, and leave existing ones empty. Do not rename or delete existing keys, as they are used internally by the plugin.

Searching for Сontacts

You can use different sorting options to find the required contacts:

• Use sorting by birthday to find contacts with the nearest birthdays.
• Use sorting by last contact date to find contacts that you haven't talked to in a long time.
• Use sorting by name to find a specific contact.

Contact Template Format

The format for the template file is YAML and is considered Frontmatter for a given page. By defining the necessary items in the frontmatter form, information about the contact is communicated through the plugin to the application. When in reading mode, the frontmatter will be formatted using an HTML table. This format is also supported by the Dataview plugin, allowing you to build queries for your contacts.

⚠️ Do not change or remove type field. It is used to detect if the current file is a contact.

⚠️ It needs to be placed at the very top of the file. Be very careful here!

---
name:
  first: carl
  last: johnson
phone: +1 555 555 5555
email: [email protected]
linkedin: linkedin.com/in/carlj567
birthday: 1966-12-06
last_contact: 2022-12-06
friends: "[[Bob]] [[Sue]]"
tags: "#contacts"
type: contact
---