Flowtaker Inbox

Send messages from Telegram to your Obsidian vault.

The bot runs directly inside Obsidian. Text yourself a note, tag a task, or send a voice message — it lands in your vault within seconds.

How it works

You → Telegram bot → Obsidian plugin (polling) → vault/inbox/note.md

The plugin polls Telegram every 30 seconds. Files are created locally in your vault folder, so iCloud, Obsidian Sync, or any other sync solution picks them up automatically.

Features

• Text notes — any message is saved as a .md file with YAML frontmatter
• Tags — #tag in your message becomes tags: [tag] in frontmatter and is stripped from the body
• Forwarded messages — source is recorded in forwarded_from frontmatter field
• Tasks (#todo) — bot asks where to route them: sprint or backlog, then appends as - [ ] task
• Voice transcription — voice messages are transcribed via Groq Whisper and saved as notes
• /status — bot replies with the last saved filename

Note format

Filename: DDMMYYYY_HHMMSS.md

---
created: 2026-07-04T15:30:00
source: telegram
type: text
tags: [idea, work]
---

Your message text here

Setup

1. Create a Telegram bot

Each user needs their own bot — the plugin polls Telegram directly from your computer, so a shared bot can't tell which vault a message belongs to.

1. Open @BotFather
2. Send /newbot → set a name and username
3. Copy the Bot Token (1234567890:AAF...)

2. Get your Telegram User ID

Message @userinfobot — it replies with your numeric ID.

3. Install the plugin

From Obsidian (after community approval): Settings → Community plugins → Search "Flowtaker Inbox" → Install

Manual install:

VAULT="$HOME/path/to/your/vault"
mkdir -p "$VAULT/.obsidian/plugins/flowtaker-inbox"
cp main.js manifest.json "$VAULT/.obsidian/plugins/flowtaker-inbox/"

Then: Settings → Community plugins → enable "Flowtaker Inbox"

4. Configure

Open Settings → Flowtaker Inbox:

• Paste your Bot Token
• Enter your Allowed User ID
• Adjust paths if needed (defaults work for most setups)

Settings

Tasks workflow

Send a message with #todo:

Buy oat milk #todo
Write blog post #todo

The bot replies with inline buttons: 📋 To sprint / 📦 To backlog.
Tap one — tasks are appended as - [ ] ... to the configured file.

Use #todos to add a context line (plain text, not a checkbox):

Project planning session #todos
Define MVP scope #todo
Write tech spec #todo

Voice transcription

Requires a Groq API key (free tier available).

Send a voice message → plugin downloads and transcribes it via whisper-large-v3-turbo → saves to inbox with type: voice in frontmatter.

Troubleshooting

Messages not appearing

• Check Bot Token and User ID in plugin settings
• Make sure you're writing to your own bot
• Open Obsidian console (Ctrl+Shift+I → Console) for errors

Plugin stops after Obsidian restart

• Normal behavior — lastUpdateId is saved in data.json, no messages will be duplicated on restart

Voice not transcribing

• Add Groq API key in settings
• Voice messages must be under Telegram's file size limit (~20 MB)

License

MIT