Claude Code Skills

An Obsidian plugin that connects your notes to the Claude Code CLI. Highlight any text in a note, right-click to select a skill, and get a streaming AI response in a persistent side panel — without leaving Obsidian.

Features

• Right-click selected text → pick a Claude Code skill → response streams into the sidebar
• Persistent side panel — stays open while you read and edit your notes
• Multi-turn conversation — follow-up questions in the same session (full context preserved via --resume)
• Freeform chat — open the panel without selecting text via the ribbon icon or command palette
• Loading animation — three-dot bounce while Claude is connecting and thinking
• Full conversation export — save the entire transcript (user messages + all responses) as a vault note
• Linux process isolation — subprocess wrapped in systemd-run --scope with IPAddressDeny=any where available

Requirements

• Claude Code CLI installed and authenticated (claude binary on your PATH)
• Obsidian desktop app (plugin is desktop-only — uses Node.js child_process)

Network usage: This plugin spawns the claude CLI as a subprocess. The CLI communicates with the Anthropic API over the internet. No data is sent by this plugin directly — all network activity goes through the Claude Code CLI.

Installation

From Community Plugins (once approved)

1. Settings → Community plugins → Browse
2. Search for Claude Code Skills
3. Install and enable

Manual installation

1. Download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest release
2. Copy them to <your-vault>/.obsidian/plugins/claude-code-skills/
3. Settings → Community plugins → enable Claude Code Skills

Configuration

Settings → Claude Code Skills:

The claude binary is auto-detected from common install locations on first load. Run which claude in a terminal if auto-detection fails.

Usage

Skill dispatch (primary workflow)

1. Highlight any text in a note (e.g., a YARA rule, a log snippet, a code block)
2. Right-click → select Claude: [skill name] from the context menu
3. The side panel opens — your selected text appears as a user bubble and Claude's response streams in
4. Type follow-up questions in the input box at the bottom (Enter to send, Shift+Enter for newline)
5. Optionally: Create Note to save the full conversation transcript, or Copy last for just the last response
6. Close Session when done — kills the subprocess and closes the panel

Freeform chat (no selection required)

• Click the bot icon in the left ribbon, or
• Ctrl+P → Open Claude Code Skills panel

The panel opens empty and you can type anything. Claude runs with the context of your configured working directory.

Skills

This plugin reads skills from ~/.claude/skills/. Each skill is a directory with a SKILL.md file containing YAML frontmatter:

~/.claude/skills/
  my-skill/
    SKILL.md    ← frontmatter: name, description

SKILL.md frontmatter example:

---
name: My Skill
description: What this skill does
---

If no skills are found, the right-click menu will be empty but the freeform panel still works.

How it works

The plugin spawns claude --print --output-format stream-json --include-partial-messages as a subprocess:

• Initial skill invocation sends /{skillId}\n\n{selected text} on stdin
• Follow-up messages use --resume <sessionId> for multi-turn continuation
• Streamed JSON events are parsed as they arrive — text appears chunk by chunk
• On Linux, the subprocess is wrapped in systemd-run --scope --user -p IPAddressDeny=any for process isolation
• The subprocess is killed if the panel is closed or Close Session is clicked

Building from source

git clone https://github.com/p3nguln5/obsidian-claude-code-skills.git
cd obsidian-claude-code-skills
npm install       # one-time: installs build tools
npm run build     # compiles src/*.ts → main.js

Then copy main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css to your vault's .obsidian/plugins/claude-code-skills/ directory.

For development with auto-rebuild on save: npm run dev

License

MIT — see LICENSE