Unread Changes

See what changed in a shared Obsidian vault before an important update slips past you. Unread Changes marks notes changed by another device, collaborator, or automation, then gives you the context and controls to review them.

What you get

• A blue unread dot on changed notes, with dots and optional unread counts on their folders.
• An unread inbox showing changed notes, attribution, and a plain-English summary when one is available.
• A virtual banner above a changed note with links to its changelog and diff.
• Mark a note as read or unread from the banner, file menu, or command palette.
• Mark all inbox items as read, or mark a folder as read.
• Read state that syncs across devices without modifying your note content.
• Automatic read marking after a configurable dwell, instant marking, or manual-only control.
• Per-write changelog notes with attribution and exact diffs.

Your own edits do not create unread alerts on the device where you made them. Notes are never modified to display the banner.

In development: sectioned inbox views and urgency colours are not shipped yet.

Install

When Unread Changes is available in the Community Plugins browser:

1. Open Settings → Community plugins → Browse.
2. Search for Unread Changes and select Install.
3. Select Enable.

For local testing, copy main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css into <vault>/.obsidian/plugins/unread-changes/, then enable the plugin in Settings → Community plugins.

Settings

Open Settings → Unread Changes to choose:

• Your device name for attribution.
• Whether notes become read after a few seconds, immediately, or only manually.
• The dwell time used by automatic marking.
• Whether folder unread counts and changed-note banners are shown.
• Folders to exclude from tracking.
• The folders used for synced read state and changelog notes.

The plugin works on desktop and mobile. A sync service is needed for read state and badges to travel between devices.

Development

npm install
npm test
npm run build
npm run lint

The MIT licence is included in LICENSE.