Property Logs

An Obsidian plugin that automatically logs property changes in frontmatter with timestamps. Track status updates, deadline changes, priority shifts, and any other property mutations to build a rich audit trail for your notes.

Features

• Automatic property tracking — Watch any frontmatter property for changes and automatically log them to a history array with timestamps
• Flexible filtering — Include/exclude specific folders and tags to control which notes are tracked
• Smart deduplication — Optionally skip logging duplicate status values or overwrite same-day entries
• Comments — Add timestamped comments to notes to annotate status history
• Daily note logging — Mirror property changes into your daily note using tag-based templates, so you can see at a glance what moved each day
• Visual status charts — Insert interactive charts that visualize how status evolved over time across multiple notes (requires Dataview and Obsidian Charts)
• Customizable keys — Rename the history key and property names to match your vault's naming conventions
• Multiple tracked properties — Go beyond status—track deadline changes, priority updates, assignees, or any other property

Use Cases

Project & Task Management

• Track project status evolution — See how a project moved from Planned → Active → Completed with exact dates
• Monitor milestone deadlines — Log when deadlines shift, detect scope creep
• Visualize team capacity — Chart how many projects were Active, In Progress, or Blocked each month

Content Management

• Publishing workflow — Track Draft → Review → Scheduled → Published with timestamps
• Content priority tracking — Monitor how content priorities changed before publication
• Audience reach visualization — Chart how many articles were Featured vs. Archived each period

Knowledge Management

• Note maturity tracking — Watch notes progress from Seedling → Growing → Evergreen
• Research status — Monitor whether research topics are Exploring, Consolidating, or Complete
• Learning progress — Chart concept mastery levels over time

OKR & Goal Tracking

• Goal progress — Log goal status changes (Planning → Active → Achieved → Archived)
• Quarterly performance — Visualize OKR completion rates per quarter
• Initiative tracking — Monitor initiatives across pipeline stages

General Audit Trails

• Change history — Maintain a full audit trail of any property that matters to you
• Decision documentation — Log when decisions change status with optional comments
• Compliance — Create timestamped records of status/property changes for audit purposes

How It Works

The plugin monitors your vault's metadata cache. When a property in a watched note changes, it automatically appends an entry to a configurable history array in the note's frontmatter. Only changes are logged—the first time a property is seen, it becomes the baseline.

Example

A note with status changes might look like this:

---
title: Launch new website
status: Active
color: blue
status_history:
  - dateSet: "2025-01-15"
    statusSet: Backlog
  - dateSet: "2025-02-20"
    statusSet: Active
---

If you track additional properties (e.g., deadline), changed values appear in the same history entry:

---
title: Launch new website
status: Active
deadline: "2025-04-30"
status_history:
  - dateSet: "2025-01-15"
    statusSet: Backlog
  - dateSet: "2025-02-20"
    statusSet: Active
    deadlineSet: "2025-04-30"
  - dateSet: "2025-02-28"
    comment: "Deadline extended due to scope changes"
    deadlineSet: "2025-05-15"
---

Installation

1. Download main.js and manifest.json from the latest release
2. Create a folder .obsidian/plugins/property-logs/ in your vault
3. Place both files in that folder
4. Reload Obsidian or restart it
5. Go to Settings → Community Plugins and enable Property Logs

Alternatively, install via BRAT (Obsidian plugin manager):

1. Install BRAT and enable it
2. Add the repository: https://github.com/connradolisboa/status-logger
3. Enable Property Logs in Community Plugins

Configuration

Settings Overview

Open Settings → Property Logs to configure three main sections: Filters, Behavior, and Chart Defaults.

Filters Tab

Control which notes the plugin monitors:

Setting	Description
Included Folders	Only track files in these folders. Leave empty to track all (unless excluded). You can specify paths like Projects or Projects/Active.
Included Tags	Only track files with these tags. Leave empty to track all (unless excluded). Tags are specified without the # symbol (e.g., tracked, monitored).
Excluded Folders	Never track files in these folders. Exclusions take priority over inclusions.
Excluded Tags	Never track files with these tags. Exclusions take priority over inclusions.

Examples:

• Track only files in the Projects folder: Add Projects to Included Folders
• Track all files except archive: Add Archive to Excluded Folders
• Track files tagged with tracked and important: Add both to Included Tags
• Track everything except files tagged no-log: Add no-log to Excluded Tags

Behavior Tab

Customize logging behavior and property names.

Logging Options

Setting	Description
Overwrite same-day entries	When enabled, only the latest change per day is kept (older changes the same day are replaced). Useful to avoid cluttering history with minor adjustments.
Skip duplicate status	When enabled, a status change is not logged if it matches the most recent entry. Prevents logging redundant state transitions.

Property Keys

Customize the frontmatter keys used in history entries:

Setting	Default	Description
History key	property_history	The frontmatter array where all history entries are stored
Date key	dateSet	The field name used for the date within each history entry
Status key	statusSet	The field name used for the status value within each history entry

Change these if your vault uses different naming conventions (e.g., use timestamp instead of dateSet).

Additional Tracked Properties

Beyond status, track any other frontmatter property. Specify:

• Frontmatter key — The property name in your note (e.g., deadline, priority, assignee)
• History key — The key to use in history entries (e.g., deadlineSet, prioritySet)

Example: To track deadline changes alongside status:

• Add Frontmatter key: deadline
• Add History key: deadlineSet

When the deadline property changes, it appears in the history entry:

- dateSet: "2025-02-28"
  deadlineSet: "2025-05-15"
  comment: "Deadline extended"

Daily Note Log Tab

Mirror tracked property changes into your daily note. When a watched property changes on a file, a configurable line is appended to today's daily note — useful for skimming what moved each day without opening every project.

Setting	Description
Enable daily note logging	Master switch for the feature
Folder (fallback)	Folder where daily notes live. Used only if the core Daily Notes plugin is disabled
Date format (fallback)	Moment.js format for the daily-note filename (e.g. YYYY-MM-DD). Falls back to this only if the core Daily Notes plugin is disabled
Heading (optional)	If set, entries are inserted under this heading (e.g. ## Status Changes). The heading is created if missing. Leave empty to append at the end of the note

If the core Daily Notes plugin is enabled, its folder and date format are used automatically — the fallback values only apply when it's disabled.

Log Groups

Each group routes notes tagged with a given tag to a specific log template. The first group whose tag matches the changed note wins. If no group matches, nothing is logged.

Field	Description
Tag	Tag (without #) that the source note must carry to use this group
Watched keys	Optional comma-separated list of keys to log. Leave empty to log every tracked change. Switch between matching by frontmatter key (e.g. status) or history key (e.g. statusSet)
Template	The line written to the daily note. Supports placeholders: {{link}}, {{name}}, {{path}}, {{key}}, {{from}}, {{to}}, {{date}}, {{time}}

Example template:

- {{time}} {{link}} — {{key}}: {{from}} → {{to}}

When the status on a note tagged project flips from Backlog to Active, the daily note gets:

- 14:32 [[Launch new website]] — status: Backlog → Active

Chart Defaults Tab

Pre-fill defaults when inserting charts. These are automatically updated each time you insert a chart with custom parameters.

Setting	Description
Default folder	Folder path to filter pages by (e.g., Projects)
Default tags	Tags to filter pages by, comma-separated without # (e.g., area, project)
Default period	Time interval for chart X-axis: Week, Month, Quarter, or Year
Default start date	Start of the date range (YYYY-MM-DD format)
Default end date	End of the date range (YYYY-MM-DD format)

Commands

The plugin adds two commands (accessible via Ctrl/Cmd+P command palette):

Insert Status Chart

Opens a modal to configure and insert a dataviewjs chart block.

Parameters:

• Folder — Filter pages by vault folder path (e.g., Projects). Leave blank for all folders.
• Tags — Filter pages by tags, comma-separated without # (e.g., area, project). Leave blank for all tags.
• Period — Time interval for the X-axis: Week, Month, Quarter, or Year
• Start date — Start of the date range (YYYY-MM-DD)
• End date — End of the date range (YYYY-MM-DD)

The chart is inserted as a dataviewjs code block at your cursor position.

Requirements: Dataview and Obsidian Charts must be installed and enabled.

Add Comment to Note

Opens a modal to add a timestamped comment to the current note's history.

Comments are logged to the same history entry as status changes on the same day (or create a new entry if no status change occurred). Useful for annotating why a status changed or adding context to a property change.

Supported Status Values

The chart recognizes these standard status values. They map to numeric levels for visualization:

Status	Level	Appearance
Inactive, New, Cancelled	1	Circle marker
Backlog	2	—
Ongoing	3	—
Active	4	—
Done	5	—

Use any other status values; they'll appear as blank on the chart but are still logged in history.

Chart Behavior

• Multi-line visualization — Each note becomes a line on the chart, colored by its color frontmatter field
• Supported colors — Todoist color names (e.g., blue, green, grape, red, orange) or hex codes (e.g., #FF5733)
• Baseline value — Notes with no history yet show as Inactive
• Future periods — Notes created after a period's end don't appear for earlier periods
• Shape markers — Special point shapes distinguish Inactive (●), New (▲), and Cancelled (✕)
• Time spanning — Chart spans entire date range even if some notes have no data

Examples

Example 1: Track Project Status

Set up tracking for projects in the Projects folder:

1. Add Projects to Included Folders in settings
2. Add a status field to project notes: status: Backlog
3. Change the status as work progresses → The plugin logs each change automatically
4. Run Insert Status Chart and filter by folder Projects to visualize progress

Example 2: Track Multiple Properties

Monitor both status and deadline for tasks:

1. In Additional Tracked Properties, add:
   • Frontmatter key: deadline → History key: deadlineSet
   • Frontmatter key: priority → History key: prioritySet
2. Add to your notes:

   status: Backlog
   deadline: "2025-04-30"
   priority: P2

3. When either deadline or priority changes, both appear in the history:

   - dateSet: "2025-02-28"
     statusSet: Active
     deadlineSet: "2025-05-15"
     prioritySet: P1

Example 3: Selective Tracking

Track all project notes except archived ones:

1. Add Projects to Included Folders
2. Add Archive to Excluded Folders
3. Now only active project notes in Projects are tracked (excluding Projects/Archive)

Example 4: Tag-Based Tracking

Track only notes tagged with tracked:

1. Add tracked to Included Tags
2. Leave folders empty
3. Only notes with the tracked tag will be monitored

Add the tag to any note you want to monitor, regardless of folder.

Tips & Tricks

• Separate concerns — Use included folders for broad scoping (e.g., all projects) and tags for fine-grained control (e.g., only "high-visibility" projects)
• Comments for context — Use "Add comment to note" to annotate why a status changed for later review
• Consolidate same-day changes — Enable "Overwrite same-day entries" if you frequently adjust properties and only care about the final state per day
• Chart filtering — Always check the chart command's folder/tags to ensure you're visualizing the right subset of notes
• Baseline stability — The first time a property is seen becomes the baseline (not logged). Subsequent changes are logged. This prevents spurious entries when enabling tracking on an existing note

How It Compares

Feature	Property Logs	Obsidian Dataview	Obsidian Tasks
Auto-log property changes	✓	✗	✗
Track any property	✓	✗	Partial
History per note	✓	✗	✗
Status timeline charts	✓	Manual queries	Task-only
Comments in history	✓	✗	✗
Configurable filtering	✓	✓	✗

Limitations

• Charts require Dataview and Obsidian Charts plugins
• Status values outside the standard set (Inactive, Backlog, Ongoing, Active, Done, etc.) won't be charted but are still logged
• Charts don't currently support filtering by multiple status values simultaneously
• Property changes are logged based on metadata cache updates; changes not reflected in the cache may not be detected

Technical Details

• Non-destructive — All frontmatter edits use Obsidian's processFrontMatter API
• Persistent state — Baseline property values are saved to plugin data, so tracking state survives vault restarts
• Metadata cache — The plugin listens to metadata cache changes, so updates are instant within Obsidian
• No external APIs — All logging and charting happens locally in your vault

Support

Found a bug or have a feature request? Open an issue on GitHub.

License

ISC