Plain Timeline

日本語

Write a timeline as plain text in your note and see it drawn — vertically or horizontally, as evenly spaced cards or to scale. Year-only dates, months, days, years before the common era and periods that are still going on all work.

Four layouts

Each timeline picks its own orientation and look. Use the small switch at the top right of a timeline, or write it in the block.

	Cards — evenly spaced, best for events	Scale — lengths follow time, best for periods
Vertical
Horizontal

Syntax

```plain-timeline
> title The French Revolution
- [1789-07-14] Storming of the Bastille | The revolution begins in Paris
@ [1792-09-21~1804-05-18] First Republic | Monarchy abolished
@ [1793-09~1794-07] #red Reign of Terror | [[Robespierre]] and the Committee of Public Safety
- [-490] Battle of Marathon
= [1815-06-18] Waterloo
```

Lines

A longer item looks like this:

```plain-timeline
- [2026-09-01, 2026-09-10~2026-09-12] Midterm exams | Chapters 1–3
  Bring the textbook and the handouts.

  - Practice set A
  - Practice set B
```

Options

Every option can also be written in Japanese (> 向き 横, > 見た目 時間軸, > タイトル …, > 開始, > 終了, > 今日, > 間隔 詰める, > 説明 ホバー, > 高さ).

Dates

Dates can be a year (1789), a month (1789-07) or a day (1789-07-14). Negative years are before the common era (-490 → 490 BCE); very large spans such as -13800000000 work too. Write years 1–99 with four digits (0079-08-24), because a two-digit year next to a month follows the two-digit-year setting (19-03-04 → 2019).

In the settings you can switch the order to day–month–year or month–day–year. Separators -, /, . or none are all accepted (20261021, 202610, 21/10/2026, 211026 …), and so are full-width digits and ～ typed with a Japanese input method.

Lines that cannot be read — a bad date, an unknown option or value, an item outside > start/> end — are listed in a small note under the timeline instead of disappearing silently.

Descriptions and links

Text after | is the description. Both [[wiki links]] and [text](url) links work inside names and descriptions. On the horizontal time axis, descriptions appear beside an item when you hover it, and are also listed under the axis when set to "always show".

Clicking an item opens, in order: the link inside it, a note with the same name, or the place in the current note where the name first appears. If an item contains links, only those links are clickable (this can be changed in the settings). ⌘/Ctrl-click opens a new tab. Items can be reached with Tab and opened with Enter, and links show Obsidian's page preview.

The time axis

The scale look picks calendar steps — days, weeks, months or years — to fit the width, keeps half a step of air at each end, and labels the year where it changes. Labels never overlap: when items are close together, the axis stretches a little there.

Note view

A log written as headings can be read as a timeline too. List folders under Settings → Note view (for example Projects/*/Worklog; * is one folder name, ** any depth). In reading view, notes inside them show every ## heading that starts with a time — ## 2026-10-21 23:52 Kick-off, ## 09:30 Stand-up, or a time in parentheses such as ## Review (2026-10-22T00:23+09:00) — with the time in a column on the left, the title beside it, and the section below as one card on a line. The date is shown where it changes. Headings without a time stay as they are. The note itself is not changed, and editing works as usual.

A heading with only a date (### 2026-10-21 Release, or Release (2026-10-21)) is an entry for that day, shown with the day in the time column. A heading with only a time (## 09:30 Stand-up) takes its date from the dated heading above it, or else from the note's date property or a YYYY-MM-DD file name, so a daily note becomes a dated timeline as it is. Dates may also be written 2026/10/21. Times are shown as written; time zones such as +09:00 or JST are not converted. Click a time (or press Enter on it) to edit the note at that entry.

A single note can opt in or out with plain-timeline: notes or plain-timeline: off in its properties. Add a color after a folder (Projects/*/Worklog #green) to tint its notes; otherwise the first period color is used. The heading level can be changed in the settings, or for one note with plain-timeline-heading: 3 in its properties.

Mobile

On phones the vertical layouts become a single column. On phones and tablets the buttons and items are larger, and tapping an item on the horizontal axis shows its details under the timeline. Wide timelines fade at the edge while there is more to scroll.

Settings

Language (English / 日本語 / follow Obsidian) · default orientation and look · date order in blocks · two-digit years · date display (localized, ISO, or a custom pattern such as DD/MM/YYYY or YYYY年M月D日) · BCE label · descriptions always or on hover · clickable items · layout switch · period colors and their order · density · sort order · minimum width of the horizontal axis · notes about unreadable lines.

Credits

The line syntax is compatible with Chronos Timeline (MIT), so existing Chronos-style lines can be pasted into a plain-timeline block.

License

MIT