Redacted

An Obsidian plugin that permanently replaces selected text with block characters, or any character you choose — the classic declassified-document look, right in your notes.

Select some text and run Redact selection — from the command palette, the right-click menu, or the eraser ribbon icon — and the selection is immediately replaced:

My password is hunter2 and my cat's name is Miso.

becomes (with hunter2 selected):

My password is ███████ and my cat's name is Miso.

Features

• Three ways to redact — command palette, right-click context menu (appears whenever text is selected), or the eraser ribbon icon.
• Three redaction styles:
  • Per character (default) — one redaction character per character, so the redaction is one-to-one: secret name → ███████████
  • Preserve spaces — spaces stay visible so word boundaries remain: secret name → ██████ ████
  • Fixed length — each line becomes a constant run of 5 redaction characters, so no word or line length leaks: secret name → █████
• Choice of redaction character — pick from a dropdown of presets (█ ░ ▒ ▓ ■ ● ★ ✦ ✱), or choose Custom… and type or paste any single character (♥, ☀, an emoji…).
• Limited folders — optionally restrict redaction to specific folders, picked from a vault-folder picker, so the command is only active where it's meant to be used.
• Excluded folders — turn redaction off in specific folders (e.g. Archive), even inside a limited folder, so you can allow it everywhere except a few folders, or in a folder except one of its subfolders.
• Live preview — the settings tab shows a before/after example of your current style and character.
• Multiple selections — hold Option (Alt on Windows/Linux) and drag to add more selections, then redact them all at once. Each is redacted to its own length, in a single undoable step.
• Shape-preserving — multi-line selections keep their line breaks in every style, and blank lines stay blank.
• Searchable settings — built on Obsidian's declarative settings API, so every option shows up in the global settings search.

Settings

• Limited folders — restrict redaction to notes inside specific folders. Add one with the list's + control, which opens a folder picker; each folder is listed by its path (e.g. Notes/Sensitive), and ✕ removes it. Leave the list empty to allow redaction anywhere. Renaming or moving a limited folder updates the list automatically; a folder that no longer exists in the vault (one deleted since, or a path typed by hand in an earlier version) is flagged under its row. Running the command outside a limited folder shows a notice instead of silently doing nothing.
• Excluded folders — added, listed, and kept up to date through renames and moves the same way as limited folders. Redaction is never available in notes inside them, even when the folder sits inside a limited folder; running the command there shows a notice.
• Redaction style — Per character, Preserve spaces, or Fixed length (see above). The description under the dropdown changes to explain whichever style is selected. Note that Preserve spaces reveals word lengths, which makes short redacted phrases easier to guess.
• Redaction character — the preset dropdown, plus Custom… for any single character. Blank or invisible characters and Markdown symbols (ASCII punctuation such as * - # ~) aren't accepted: the first would make redacted text look like empty space, the second can turn it into formatting — a divider, a heading, or a code block. For an asterisk look, use the ✱ Heavy asterisk preset instead of *.
• Preview — a live before/after example showing your current redaction style and character in action.

Important: what "permanent" does and doesn't mean

Redaction rewrites the text in your note. The original characters are gone from the note itself — but copies of them can survive elsewhere:

• Undo history: Ctrl+Z / Cmd+Z restores the original text for as long as the note's editor history exists. Close and reopen the note (or restart Obsidian) if you want the undo path gone.
• File Recovery: Obsidian's built-in File Recovery core plugin keeps periodic snapshots of your notes. A snapshot taken before redaction still contains the original text until it expires or you clear it.
• Sync and backups: any sync service, version control system (e.g. a Git repository), or backup tool may retain pre-redaction copies of the file.
• Length disclosure: in the per-character styles, the length of the redacted text remains visible. ███ tells a reader the secret was three characters long. Use the Fixed length redaction style if length itself is sensitive.

Treat Redacted as a presentation tool for notes you share or publish, not as a substitute for proper secrets management.

Edge cases worth knowing

• Emoji and accents: characters are counted as you see them, so an emoji built from several code points (👨‍👩‍👧, 👍🏽, a flag) or a letter with a combining accent becomes exactly one redaction character.
• Multi-line selections: line breaks are preserved so redacted text keeps its shape, and blank lines stay blank.
• Reading view: redaction only works in editing view, where you can see what's selected.

Installation

Requires Obsidian 1.13.0 or later.

Until the plugin is available in the community directory, install it manually:

1. Create the folder <your vault>/.obsidian/plugins/redacted/
2. Download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest release and copy them into it
3. Reload Obsidian and enable Redacted under Settings → Community plugins

Development

This is a TypeScript project. To build:

npm install
npm run build

This typechecks with tsc and bundles the sources into main.js via esbuild. npm run dev rebuilds main.js on every change instead.

To lint with eslint-plugin-obsidianmd — the same rules the community plugin review uses:

npm run lint

To release, bump the version in manifest.json, package.json, and versions.json, then push a tag that matches it exactly (e.g. 1.0.8, no v prefix). The release workflow lints, builds, and publishes main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css with build provenance attestations.

License

MIT