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Obsidian Bases For Books 📚 How To Automatically Organize Book Notes 📝 — Transcript

by Wanderloots · 7,828 words · 1,055 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00Taking the time to build a centralized,
0:02structured book base in Obsidian with
0:04automated templates, views, and formula
0:06will speed up your note-taking and
0:07organization in Obsidian forever. I love
0:10taking notes on the books I'm reading. I
0:12learn more from books than anywhere
0:13else. As I read, I write down key
0:15quotes, concepts, and ideas in Obsidian.
0:18But booknotes in Obsidian can often be
0:20disconnected and cluttered, making it
0:22hard to connect those booknotes on the
0:24information, the knowledge that I'm
0:25gaining with the rest of my vault. It
0:27can be hard to find highlights, track
0:29what I've read, or turn notes into
0:30meaningful output. I wanted a
0:32note-taking workflow for taking book
0:33notes that actually enable me to make
0:35meaningful connections to the rest of my
0:37vault. I needed a base for my books in
0:39Obsidian Library. In today's video, I'm
0:42going to walk through how to build that
0:43book space from scratch so that you
0:45never need to organize your Obsidian
0:47Library again. Hi, my name is Callum,
0:49also known as Wanderloots, and welcome
0:51to today's video on building a
0:53bookspace, your new Obsidian library.
0:55Basis lets you turn your notes into a
0:56database, which is the perfect way to
0:58organize all of your booknotes in
1:00Obsidian. You can customize the views
1:01and filters so that you get an at a
1:03glance view of what you've read, what's
1:05on your shelf, and what you've converted
1:07into your own writing. Now, you'll be
1:08able to combine the books that you're
1:10reading, and the notes that you're
1:11taking all in Obsidian so that you're
1:13constructing a single library of
1:15knowledge. If you find this video
1:16helpful, please consider hyping and
1:18subscribing as I'm working on making
1:20YouTube my full-time career. So, any
1:22support you can give me is very much
1:23appreciated. Also, I'll be making this
1:25book space as a starter kit on my
1:27website and for my YouTube members. So,
1:29if you don't want to start from scratch,
1:31please consider joining my membership
1:32and getting the books kit. Now, let's
1:34build a bookspace in your Obsidian
1:36library.
1:38Basis is a new core plugin that lets you
1:40turn your notes basically into a
1:42database. I walk through this in much
1:44more depth in my intro to bases video,
1:46so I recommend checking that out if you
1:47want to go deep into what a base is and
1:49how it works. Today is going to be more
1:51of a practical workflow on how to build
1:54from scratch a bookspace. And the reason
1:56this is so powerful that I'm going to
1:58explain at the beginning is because this
1:59enables automatic note organization.
2:02Then I'm going to get into how we can
2:03actually set up that organization by
2:05pre-organizing with properties and
2:07Obsidian core element. Like you can see
2:09here with this building a second brain
2:11note, we've got all these properties
2:12listed at the top. Then I'm going to get
2:14into templates, which is a way that you
2:16can take those templates and turn them
2:17into a cookie cutter so that you can
2:18repeat them over and over and over
2:20again. This really streamlines and makes
2:22it a lot easier for you to build
2:24consistently. And I'm going to show you
2:25a few different templates that I use so
2:27that you can adapt it to your own
2:28workflow. Then we're going to get into
2:30views and filters along with embedded
2:32options for bases. And this is where you
2:34start to get more customization and how
2:36you can actually view all of the data
2:38that you're adding to the database based
2:40on your books. Then we'll get into the
2:42formula and links, which is a way to add
2:44a dynamic element to your base, which
2:46makes it a lot easier for you to, for
2:48example, find how many notes link to a
2:50particular book note or how long it took
2:52you to actually read that book. Then
2:54finally, I'm going to go through a quick
2:56overview on what a practical workflow
2:58looks like that will actually help you
3:00take those notes that you're writing on
3:01those books and help you organize your
3:03notes in a way that you can actually
3:05make those notes usable and optionally
3:07turn them into a public display like a
3:09blog post or a digital garden. Now,
3:11let's get started with your bookspace.
3:15So, one of my favorite organization
3:16methods is the code method by Tego Forte
3:19in Building a Second Brain. This book
3:21note over here. And the idea is that we
3:23have four main elements. Capture,
3:25organize, distill, and express. So as
3:27you're reading, you capture. You keep
3:29what resonates. Then you need to
3:31organize that information so that you
3:32can actually action it. You can make it
3:34usable. Once you know where to find it,
3:36you can distill. You can look for that
3:38essence, the key elements on why you
3:40took that note in the first place. And
3:42then optionally, you can express it. you
3:44can show the work that you've actually
3:47done as a result of distilling the notes
3:49you captured from your organization
3:51system. So you can see here that's kind
3:53of how this book's base is going to
3:54work. As you read, you take notes, those
3:57notes will be automatically organized
3:59directly into the base for you. Then you
4:01can go through and you can distill maybe
4:03you extract your favorite quotes and you
4:05store those quotes in what I'm calling a
4:07map of book, which is kind of like a map
4:09of content, but it gives you an at a
4:11glance view of all of your favorite
4:12quotes from a particular book. and can
4:14optionally be expressed. So I've done
4:16this already with my digital garden at
4:18wands.xyz and you can see here how I
4:21have for example for the creative act
4:23all of my favorite quotes linked here
4:25where each note is its own series of
4:27quotes or individual quotes and it all
4:30links back to this single note here of
4:32this creative act in the middle. So the
4:34idea is to take this data view table
4:36that I currently have and as an element
4:38of what I'll show you today how we can
4:39recreate it with a base. So the whole
4:41point here is that we need to introduce
4:44a few key elements so that we can
4:46automatically organize it and make it
4:47easier to distill, express and capture
4:50your notes. So these key elements are
4:52properties, templates, views, formula,
4:55and then a workflow that ties it all
4:57together. So let's take a look at
4:58properties.
5:00So this is a previous bookspace that I
5:02built when bases first came out. And I
5:05just want to quickly show you how the
5:06properties have an impact on how the
5:08base is displayed. So, I'm going to
5:10recreate this from scratch in a moment,
5:12and I'm going to make it a little more
5:13effective given all the updates that
5:15have happened to bases lately. But you
5:16can see here that we have all of these
5:18columns where each of these columns is a
5:20property. So, in the top right, we have
5:22the option to sort, filter properties,
5:24and add new notes based on the
5:26properties that are in display here. If
5:28you think about it, when you're taking
5:29notes on a book, there's going to be a
5:31few core properties that you're going to
5:33want to keep track of. For example, you
5:35probably want the author, the genre, the
5:37book name, maybe even a reference link
5:39that takes you to Goodreads or Amazon,
5:41something that you can go find that book
5:43again quickly. So, the goal here is that
5:44we want to think about what are the core
5:47properties, what are the essential
5:48elements that we want to introduce into
5:50our bookspace so that we can filter and
5:52organize super easily. Bases makes
5:55organization in Obsidian incredibly
5:57easy, and properties are what enables
5:58that to happen. Then we have a few other
6:01optional properties that get more into
6:03how complex you want your notes to be
6:06when you're creating notes on the books
6:08that you're reading. So these also will
6:10lead to dynamic properties that I'll
6:12explain a little more later. But now
6:13that you have kind of an idea on what
6:15the properties look like, for example,
6:16here and how they feed into a base,
6:19let's create the new book space.
6:22So we can press control or command P and
6:25then we can search for base and click
6:27create new base. And then we can give
6:29this name books. So what this has done
6:31if we open it up on the side here is we
6:33can see that there's now this books with
6:35the base type on the side. So this pulls
6:38in every single note I have in my entire
6:40vault. Every base starts not as a blank
6:42page but as a full list of every one of
6:44your notes. The goal is to organize
6:47these notes in a way that we are only
6:49displaying the data that we care about.
6:51This is where we get into filtering and
6:52properties. So for example, like I
6:54mentioned, I can go filter. I can select
6:56all views here. So I can say where file
6:59tags contains any of book and that will
7:02pull in every note like for example this
7:04atomic habits note that has the tag of
7:06book. So you can already see how the
7:08book space it's only displaying books.
7:11The only notes that I've added the book
7:12tag to are books. So this is where we
7:14get into the property element where you
7:17could use a tag to organize it or you
7:19could introduce a new type of property.
7:20So, for example, rather than just saying
7:22book source template and tags contains
7:24book, I could introduce a new property
7:26like content type and call it book. And
7:29then I could go back over to my base and
7:31I could say where if all of the
7:34following are true or any of the
7:35following are true. So I can add a new
7:37filter and say where content type is
7:39exactly book. So the choice is
7:41completely up to you how you want to do
7:43this. Do you want to use a tag or do you
7:45want to use a new dedicated property?
7:47So, I've gone through and I've done this
7:48in a few different ways, and I'll
7:50explain this more as we get into the
7:51templates, but I have found personally
7:53that while tags didn't work super well
7:56originally with Obsidian Bases, they've
7:58improved it a lot, and it seems to be
8:00working fairly consistently now. So, you
8:02could use file tags to describe the type
8:05of file you're dealing with so that you
8:07can filter any of your bases very
8:09specifically, or you can introduce a new
8:11property type. It's totally up to you.
8:13The idea here is that you can use a
8:15specific type of property like the type
8:17or the tags to filter the base to only
8:20show the books and then use these other
8:23properties to help display useful
8:25information. I could bring in the file
8:26tags so that we get an idea on is the
8:28book fiction or non-fiction. Have I
8:30published it to my digital garden
8:31already? Is it a source note or is it a
8:34book that's displaying information which
8:36I'll explain in a moment how I think
8:38about that. We might want to add the
8:40author property. might want to add the
8:42genre property. You get the idea. You
8:44can add whatever properties you want
8:46here. And what's nice is in bases, you
8:48can just click and drag and move things
8:49around. Maybe I care more about the
8:51author than the file tag. So, I'll move
8:52the author earlier. And there you go.
8:54You have a base and it only is bringing
8:56in booknotes. And now we can take a look
8:58and we can consider a few more concepts
9:01here. For example, maybe we want to
9:02bring in the rating of the book. So, I
9:04could add rating. And I'll show you how
9:06you can use the rating property a little
9:08more effectively in the future when we
9:09get to the formula. But now we get to a
9:11point where okay, let's say I want to go
9:13through and I want to create the same
9:15type of file for every single book that
9:17I read can have the same type of book
9:20template associated with it. So let's
9:22take a look at templates.
9:25I just want to note that if any element
9:27of building this base feels confusing, I
9:29do have a dedicated playlist that goes
9:31more in depth on each aspect of bases
9:33that you might find helpful for
9:35expanding your library. Also, a quick
9:37reminder that if you're finding this
9:38helpful, please consider liking and
9:39subscribing. Now, let's keep building.
9:43So, the goal of templates is to automate
9:45the creation of the notes so that you
9:47can focus less on the organization and
9:49focus more on actually taking notes that
9:52are related to the books that you're
9:53reading. So, I have a few different
9:54templates that I use depending on the
9:56circumstances. And my thought with this
9:58is I'll just show you each of these
9:59templates and then you can make use of
10:01whichever one you find the most helpful.
10:03And then I'll also show you how I've
10:04created a quote template that will help
10:06me map the quotes to the book and within
10:09the book that I am taking notes on. So,
10:11let's take a look at the book source
10:12template for a second. And you can see
10:14here that this book source template
10:15doesn't have all the properties that I
10:17was even talking about here. So, I
10:18probably want to add a few of those in.
10:20So, I create this template just by
10:22creating a new note and then moving into
10:24your template folder on the side here
10:26where I have a list of all my templates.
10:28And then when you're in your settings,
10:30you can go down to templates on the side
10:31here. And you can set that template
10:33folder specifically so that when you go
10:36to apply a new note, for example, I
10:38create a new note here. I can just press
10:41command or control P, go to template,
10:43and then I can insert my book source
10:45template, and it will turn this note
10:47into that book source template. And you
10:49can see here I actually have auto mover
10:51set up that it will automatically move
10:52any note that has the tag source into
10:54its respective sources folder. So the
10:56idea here is we want to make sure that
10:58all the properties we're applying to our
11:01book source template match what we want
11:03to see inside this table. So this is
11:05where we can do it once and then you
11:07don't ever have to do it again. It's the
11:08dry principle. Don't repeat yourself.
11:10So, if you can make a template once that
11:12filters perfectly into your bookspace,
11:14becomes very easy to just quickly take
11:16notes and not have to think about how
11:17it's going to be organized or displayed.
11:19I'm not going to go too much more into
11:20properties. I feel like I've explained
11:22that. And you can go explore this
11:24however much you want. Every person is
11:26going to have different properties that
11:27they care about. So, it's up to you to
11:29design a template that works best for
11:31you. Let's take a look more at the
11:33template itself. I have a call out at
11:34the top here that just has my main
11:36takeaways, the key concepts and
11:38examples, key quotes, which I'll explain
11:40more in a moment, and then I have a
11:42section for all of my chapter notes. So,
11:44this works really well for just taking a
11:45note on whatever book I'm reading. But,
11:47as you saw here, we have the option to
11:49bring in the cover of the book itself.
11:51And we can actually organize this into a
11:54card view where we'll be able to see all
11:56of the cover properties directly. I'll
11:58explain the views more in a moment, but
12:00now I want to show you how we can get
12:01this cover property in very easily.
12:04And there's two main ways that I do
12:06this. The first is using the book search
12:08plugin and the second is using the
12:09Goodreads web clipper template. So I'm
12:11going to explain each of those for a
12:13moment. If we go into settings, we can
12:14go to community plugins, browse, and
12:16search for book search. So this plugin
12:19helps you easily create booknotes. So
12:21I'm going to install that, enable, and
12:22go over to options. So if we go over to
12:24the book search plugin settings, we can
12:26see that we can choose where we want the
12:28file to go. So for example, maybe we
12:30want to create a new folder in sources
12:32called books public because I have books
12:35non-public. And now that we have the
12:37file set, what we can do is we can press
12:39command or control P, do the book search
12:42and create new book note. And what we
12:44can do is we can search for a book here.
12:46Click search and that will pull up with
12:47a list of all of the books that we're
12:49looking for. And we can see here it's
12:50this is probably the one we're looking
12:51for, Atomic Habits by James Clear. I can
12:54click on it and it automatically
12:55prepopulates all of the information
12:58related to that book in this one spot.
13:00It includes a preview link where if you
13:01click on that it takes me to the Google
13:03books section has a link to Google books
13:05as well has the cover URL so it takes
13:07you to the actual image directly and a
13:09few other pieces of information that you
13:11might find helpful like for example
13:13category or categories which is
13:14effectively just the genre but the
13:16reason I wanted to show you this is
13:17because we now have the cover URL in
13:19here. So, for example, if I were to take
13:22this cover and go over to Atomic Habits
13:25and introduce a cover property and paste
13:27that in and go to the views, I can click
13:30add view, turn it to cards, and make
13:32sure the property that I'm using here is
13:34cover to match the one that I just saw
13:36for Atomic Habits. You can see that it
13:38pulled in the cover and it's displayable
13:40here. So, I'll explain the card view
13:42more in a moment. I just wanted to show
13:43you why I'm interested in using a tool
13:45like the book search plugin because all
13:47of those properties that I showed you
13:49can be automatically grabbed directly
13:51from the internet using the book search
13:53plugin. So now if we go back to the book
13:55search plugin settings for a moment, we
13:57can see that we have a few more options
13:59here. We can choose what we want the
14:00title to be. For example, maybe I want
14:02it to be something like this. And I'll
14:04have a little book emoji and then in
14:06curly brackets put title. So if I do
14:08that, it will automatically take the
14:09title section from that book search
14:12plugin, new note, and it'll apply that
14:14title with that emoji. Similarly, we can
14:16go through and we can create a book
14:18search plug-in template, which I'll show
14:20you in a moment. And then we can apply
14:22that template every time instead of the
14:23default one that we see here. We can
14:25turn on the show cover image in search.
14:27So that now when we go through and we
14:30press command or control P again and do
14:32the search, if we look for Atomic Habits
14:34again, we can see that it pulls up with
14:36the cover image. so you can have a
14:37better idea on if it's the actual book
14:39you're looking for. So, that's a good
14:40setting to turn on. And then we can also
14:42enable cover image save. And basically
14:44what that means is when we run the book
14:46search plugin, it will actually save a
14:48copy of that cover image to the path
14:50that we set right here. So, this is
14:52where maybe I will go through I'll go
14:54over to my folder on the side and I'm
14:56going to create a new folder inside of
14:57my attachments folder called book
14:59covers. And now I can go through and go
15:01to attachments and book covers. So now
15:03if I go through and I run this book
15:05search plugin again, it will save a
15:07local copy of that image that I can then
15:09use as the cover property inside of my
15:12base so that I can see it in the card
15:14view. In terms of the template, we can
15:15click example template and it pulls up
15:17an example that would have all the
15:19information here. So you can use this if
15:21you want to, but we can also make this a
15:23little bit more customized so that it
15:24fits our particular table if you want.
15:27So I specifically have a book search
15:28plug-in template and you can start to
15:30see here that I also have this data view
15:32table. So this is what I use
15:34specifically for my public notes. So the
15:37key difference on how I'm using this is
15:40I have my book source template which is
15:41where I take my notes directly in here.
15:43I use the book search plugin to keep
15:45track of the quotes and the information
15:47and kind of use the book search to turn
15:49it into a map of content for that book
15:51or a map of book. So this is where you
15:54can use whatever you want. You can
15:55combine all this together. use the book
15:56search plugin and then take notes
15:58directly in there with your template or
16:00you can use a separate note takingaking
16:01and key insights note. It's totally up
16:05to you. Just a quick note that I'll be
16:06making all of the templates I talk about
16:07today, including the properties for the
16:09book search plugin and my book source
16:11template and the overall base here as
16:13well available for my paying YouTube
16:15members and on my website. So, if you're
16:17interested in not creating this from
16:18scratch and just want to copy and paste
16:20all of this to get your book space
16:22going, please consider checking out my
16:23membership or my website. Now, there's
16:25one more template that I want to show
16:26you here, and this is the Goodreads web
16:28clipper template.
16:31So, I actually just made a dedicated
16:32video on this concept for the Obsidian
16:34Basis Plus Web Clipper. So, I recommend
16:36watching that video if you want to learn
16:38more about how web clipper works. But
16:39effectively, you're able to go through
16:41and create a custom template, like for
16:43example, Goodreads, where you're able to
16:45preset all of the properties inside of
16:48your web clipper template in the same
16:50way that we're setting the properties
16:52inside of Obsidian. And what I can do
16:54is, for example, I have the template
16:56trigger to match specifically
16:58goodreads.com/book
16:59slash. So if I go over to Goodreads,
17:01there's this little Obsidian Web Clipper
17:03icon in the top right. And if I click on
17:05that, it will automatically pull in all
17:07of the properties that I had set inside
17:09of that web clipper template, including
17:11the description, where I can just go
17:13like this and click add to obsidian, and
17:15it will automatically create the note
17:16inside of my Obsidian vault, including
17:18importantly the cover image for that
17:20book. So, this is another way where
17:21we're able to use that template to
17:24pre-organize the properties that we want
17:26to have and then use those properties
17:28inside of our bookspace here. So, then
17:30not only do we have the average rating
17:33of Goodreads for that book, but we also
17:35have the option to add in our own
17:36rating. We've got a brief overview of
17:39the description here and then it ends.
17:41So what we could do for example now I
17:43could take this book source and my
17:45thought is that this is a good one for
17:47notes and what I do is I use the book
17:49search template for creating the public
17:51facing side of my notes for example like
17:53this one here and I use the Goodreads
17:55template alongside my book source
17:57template to combine them into a place to
17:59take notes. Which one you want to use is
18:02totally up to you. But the key here is
18:03that in all of them we're using the same
18:06type of tags. So you must make sure that
18:08your tag is consistent with the filter
18:10that you've applied to all views inside
18:12your vault which you can have multiple.
18:13For example, I could say where file tags
18:15contains any of book or books. And now
18:17this one here, this creative act a way
18:19of being, it's now been included inside
18:20of here, the same note. Then I'll get
18:22into the quote template in a moment
18:24because I think it's actually probably
18:25more helpful now to see how we can use
18:27all this information that we've just
18:28built with those templates and start to
18:31display them in different views so that
18:33we can really start to use the bookspace
18:35as a proper database.
18:38Now the first view I want to show you is
18:39the card view because I think that turns
18:41your bookspace into effectively a
18:43library. So what we can do is if you
18:46want rather than just clicking add new
18:47view we can go to this table view here
18:49and we can click duplicate view and then
18:52we can call it covers. So what this does
18:54by clicking duplicate we now have
18:56exactly the same information in both
18:58views here. So all of the rating the
19:00author the file tag the genre all of
19:02those properties now have been directly
19:04duplicated to the covers view and all we
19:06need to do is go here and change the
19:08layout to cards. Then we need to set our
19:11image property and this can be whatever
19:12you want. I personally have been using
19:14cover, so I'm going to turn that one on.
19:16And you can see that brings in the cover
19:18here. And you start to get an idea on
19:19how it looks. Like maybe, for example,
19:21we don't need to have file tags here.
19:23So, we can go over here and turn off
19:25tags. Maybe we turn off file name
19:26because we can already see it in the
19:28card view. We can control the size of
19:30the card here so that it looks a little
19:32more effective. And we can change the
19:34aspect ratio so that it's something that
19:36fits more of a book vibe. That looks
19:39pretty good. You can see I've got a
19:40couple duplicates here. I'll clean that
19:41up after. So now we have the card view.
19:43The key here is to go through and start
19:45adding cards. So for example, if we go
19:47back to the table here, I could go to
19:49properties, search for cover, and we get
19:52a sense here on which files have cover
19:56properties. And if you don't have one,
19:57that's where you can go back and you
19:59could, for example, maybe in building a
20:00second brain here, I have two options. I
20:03can go use the book search plugin to
20:04either insert the metadata which would
20:06include the cover image or I can go back
20:09to the internet search for the book
20:11building a second brain. And now if I go
20:13up in the top right here where I have
20:15the Obsidian web clipper because I have
20:16the cover file here I can just go like
20:18that and save it and go and add this
20:20cover URL. And now if I go back to my
20:23bookspace to the card view you can see
20:25that the cover image has already
20:26populated correctly. So we can do that
20:28for each of the books here. We can add a
20:30cover. Maybe I want to go look for
20:31blink. grab the image URL, paste it in,
20:34and now I've got that cover image. So
20:36you can go through and do this for each
20:37of your books, or if you're using the
20:39book search template or the Goodreads
20:41template, you'll automatically have that
20:43property built into the file already. So
20:46that shows you the card view. Now we can
20:47start to get into filtering the actual
20:49database itself.
20:52Let's say I want to have fiction view
20:55and a non-fiction view. I can go here,
20:57duplicate view, call this non-fiction.
21:00And now what I can do is if I go over to
21:02the filter section here, rather than
21:03having a filter on is this a book for
21:06the all views, I can go specifically
21:08into this view and I can say where tags
21:11contains any of non-fiction. And now
21:14what I've done is I've just used the
21:15tags property here to filter only books
21:18that are non-fiction books. And I can do
21:20the same thing where I can just take
21:21this non-fiction table, duplicate the
21:23view, call it fiction, and then change
21:25the filter property for this view and
21:27change it to fiction only. So you can
21:28see here I have a few books that because
21:30my source template has both fiction and
21:33non-fiction tags in it, I need to clear
21:35a few. So I can go to Finite Infinite
21:37Games, toggle off fiction, and now that
21:39will have been removed from the fiction
21:41table and maintained inside of the
21:43non-fiction table. And again, all of
21:45these can be cards or a table view. So I
21:48can choose to go into non-fiction here,
21:50change this to a card view, and I get
21:52the card view. Make sure I change the
21:53cover property. And I can go through and
21:55do all of the same things that I was
21:57doing before for the card view. When you
21:58create a new view, you can choose if you
22:00want to duplicate the table or the cover
22:02view. It's totally up to you what you
22:03prefer to see. And as another example of
22:05a view, maybe I only want to see my anti
22:08library. And this would be all books
22:09that I have not read yet.
22:12So I'm going to duplicate this cover
22:14view. Call this anti library. And now
22:17what I'm going to do is go to the filter
22:18here. And I'm just going to say where
22:20rating is empty. So for example, this
22:22book I have actually read. there's no
22:23rating property. So if I change this to
22:25a five and go back to the base, it will
22:27have been removed from here because I've
22:29set this filter to be rating is empty.
22:31In a similar way, I can duplicate this
22:33view and I can call this favorites. And
22:35this is where I can start to get into a
22:37bit more interesting property types
22:39because I could say, for example, rather
22:41than where rating is empty, I could say
22:43where rating is greater than or equal to
22:45four. And that will only pull up books
22:47that have a score of four or higher. So
22:49you can start to see here how we can
22:51really create our own library using the
22:53bookspace. It basically is just a
22:55library where you can go through and you
22:57can sort by genre. You can sort by
22:59topic. You can sort by whether you've
23:01read it or not or if it's one of your
23:02favorite books. You can add as many
23:04different types of views as you want to
23:05in here so that you can easily find the
23:07book and then find the notes related to
23:09it. And if you're interested in building
23:10a digital garden like I have here at
23:12wanderloo.xyz, XY Z. I actually have a
23:14video on how I publish my Obsidian notes
23:16to my digital garden for free and what a
23:18digital garden is as separate videos.
23:19So, I recommend checking those out if
23:21you're interested. But that's
23:22effectively where I take these notes
23:23here and I create that map of book or
23:25map of content for the book and publish
23:27it. So, maybe I want to go through here,
23:29duplicate my favorites view, call this
23:32digital garden. And this is where I'm
23:34going to change the property here from
23:36rating to DG publish is checked. So now
23:39if I go back to my book note here on the
23:41creative act, I can add a property here
23:43of DG publish equals true. That would
23:45publish it now to my digital garden and
23:47I can say where DG publish is true and
23:49that pulls up all of my notes like the
23:51creative act here that I have published
23:53to my digital garden. So now I have
23:55basically a public view and I can also
23:56have a private view. And in the future
23:58the views are going to include the
24:00ability for you to group by topic. So
24:02you could have a different view here
24:03where you have your overarching table
24:05view or your overarching cover view and
24:07you could have them actually grouped by
24:09the topic or the genre that you have in
24:11there. Now there's one more view I want
24:12to show you here which I'm going to call
24:14the quote view here.
24:17So I'm going to duplicate the table
24:19view. Let's call this quotes. And I'm
24:21going to change the quote filter where
24:23file tag contains quote. This is where I
24:26can create a new template and I can add
24:28the property of reference. And this is
24:30where I will reference the specific
24:32book. I'll insert tags and I'll give it
24:34quote. And you can go through and add
24:36whatever properties you want here. Maybe
24:38I'll also add DG publish is true or not.
24:40So I can move it to my digital garden. I
24:42can add the author property. All of the
24:44same types of properties we added for
24:45the book template we can do for the
24:47quote template. And the idea here is if
24:49I'm going through and I'm taking notes
24:50on building a second brain, I can
24:52always, for example, go like this and
24:55click extract current selection and
24:57create a new note and call this intro to
25:00building a second brain or whatever you
25:02want the quote to be. Enter. It will
25:04insert that directly here and create it
25:06as a new note. And I can just insert the
25:08template for the quote and it will
25:10automatically apply the quote tag. And I
25:12can now go in here and put building a
25:14second brain and put tag book to make
25:17sure that it fits in there. And now if
25:18we go back here, we can see that in the
25:20quotes view, I now have the first quote.
25:22And of course, you can go through and
25:23fill out the author if you want because
25:25you've already filled out these
25:26properties for the books. It becomes
25:27very easy for it to be applied here. And
25:29again, you can use whatever type of
25:30template you want. You could apply the
25:32book search template along with the
25:33quote tag. You can make this template
25:35whatever you want it to be. But now
25:36what's cool is rather than just having a
25:38full list of every quote, if I go like
25:40this and duplicate this as well and call
25:42this quotes embedded alongside having
25:45the file tags contains any of quote, I
25:47can also bring in that property I just
25:49added with the reference and I can say
25:51the reference is this note. So what that
25:53means now is if I go over to the book
25:55building a second brain, I can insert at
25:57the top here the book's base. And not
26:00only that, we can see it's pulling in
26:01the entire base, but I can go over and I
26:03can specifically look for the quotes
26:05embedded view. And we can see here if I
26:07use reference contains this file name
26:10and then go back to the embedded view
26:12here, it's pulling in the quote that
26:14came from that book because it's pulling
26:17in specifically the name building a
26:18second brain and any quote related to
26:20it. So that's a cool way where now I can
26:22add as many quotes as I want to and I'll
26:24have this specific base view as built
26:27into the note itself creating a list of
26:28all of the quotes that I've extracted
26:30from this book note. So this is where if
26:33we go take a look at the properties here
26:35in the Obsidian bases syntax website
26:38there's specifically embedded bases can
26:40use this to pull in for example this
26:43file name which resolves to the name of
26:45the file embedded in the base. So what
26:47that means is if I go back to my booksp
26:49space for a second nothing will show in
26:51the embedded view here even if it is
26:53showing in the quote section because
26:55this note is called books.base not
26:57building a second brain. If we go back
26:59to my book search template and rather
27:00than just having a data view version of
27:02this which I had in the past I can now
27:04just embed the books base and reference
27:06specifically the quotes and now every
27:08time I create a new note using my book
27:10search plug-in template I'll
27:12automatically have built the books base
27:14quotes into that template. So, every
27:16single book gives you this almost map of
27:18content or the map of the book based on
27:20all of the quotes that link specifically
27:22to this book name. So, I hope that makes
27:24sense. Feel free to ask any questions in
27:26the description if you're finding this
27:27confusing. But now that you have a
27:28better idea on how we can use all of
27:30these different types of filters to
27:32create the views, let's consider what
27:34other properties we might want to add as
27:36an advanced component.
27:39Let's say, for example, I don't want
27:40just this rating on here to be five.
27:43Maybe I want to actually make it a
27:44little more visual. Then what I can do
27:46is I can go under properties, click add
27:48formula. I'll call this one rating as
27:50well because this is only a formula
27:52being applied to the table here. And I'm
27:54going to use star.re repeat rating. And
27:56you can see here it pops up saying this
27:57is a valid formula. So basically what
27:59this does is it takes the rating
28:01property like this five here and it
28:03repeats the star for that number of
28:05times. So now if we turn that property
28:07on, you can see here that all of the
28:08fives have been turned into five stars.
28:11So, if we go back to the card view, the
28:12cover view for a moment, rather than
28:14just having this kind of ugly five, I'm
28:16going to change the property to instead
28:17have the other rating, the formula
28:19rating that's got the little F in front
28:20of it. And now we get this nice little
28:22five star. So, you get this at a glance
28:23view of what you're rating. So, that's a
28:25cool way that you can use formula to
28:27modify the visualization of your
28:29bookspace. And there's a lot you can do
28:30there. There's really no end to it. And
28:32I highly recommend taking a look at the
28:34basis syntax and specifically the
28:36function because you can use all of
28:38these types of functions here to modify
28:41the information being displayed in your
28:43bookspace. And let's say I just want to
28:44know how long has this book been sitting
28:46on my shelf without having read it.
28:48Perhaps this fits into the anti- library
28:50more. So if I turn on the created time
28:52here, you can see when I created a note
28:54for that book, which you can think of as
28:56being added to my shelf. If I go over to
28:58properties, I can show you specifically
29:00how long this book has been on my shelf
29:01by doing file.c time minus today. So
29:04when was the file created and what's the
29:06duration between these two? So you can
29:08see how long a book has been sitting on
29:10your shelf for. You could do the same
29:11thing with m time and that would show
29:12you when you've last read that book. So
29:14you can control any of these properties
29:16you want through all the various
29:17formula. So you could have time on
29:19shelf, time since read, how long it took
29:21you to read it, maybe from the first
29:23edit to the last edit. You can control
29:25any of these properties and go through
29:27the function syntax to make it as
29:28customized as you want to. So there's a
29:30lot that you can go through. We could go
29:32through, for example, and pull in
29:33everything that has a link to that file
29:35so that we can start to bring in the
29:37quotes that we've been introducing. But
29:38personally, I find I like the use of the
29:41embedded view to show the quotes just to
29:43keep the book space itself a little
29:45cleaner. But you can bring in any of
29:46these things that you want. We could
29:47also do a length calculation to figure
29:49out how many quotes a particular book
29:50has which is kind of like what I have
29:52been doing with data view here where we
29:54have the number of links. If we take a
29:56look at the creative act again you can
29:58see that the number of links that
29:59connect to that particular quote. So I
30:01have an idea on for example which quotes
30:04I've been referencing the most. Now
30:05let's take a look at the final step here
30:08which to me is just a workflow. How does
30:09this actually come together in a
30:11practical sense?
30:13And for me, the way I think of this is
30:15again through the code method capture,
30:17organize, distill, express. So to
30:19capture something, I need a place to
30:21capture it to a place to put the quotes
30:22and the notes that I'm taking. So I need
30:24to create a sources note, which could
30:26either be from Goodreads, from the book
30:28search plugin, or from my book source
30:30template. It doesn't matter. It's
30:32completely up to you how you want to use
30:33it, but I like keeping my book notes
30:36separate from my digital garden
30:38published components. This lets me take
30:40all of my fleeting notes. So for
30:41referencing the zetocasten system which
30:43is why I call this atoms because I have
30:45something called the molecular
30:46zettocasten which is its whole own
30:48method of organizing information and
30:50organizing notes. So I have a whole
30:52video on zettocast in here if you're
30:53interested in learning more about how
30:55that works and why it works. So I
30:56recommend checking that out if you want
30:58to go deeper into zettocasten. But the
30:59idea is that we have these singular
31:01concepts that are being extracted. So I
31:03like having my book notes here where
31:05I've got all of my fleeting notes. So, I
31:07dump all the information here as I'm
31:08taking notes in the book and then I'll
31:10go back through it afterwards and
31:12extract the key components and those are
31:14what will be displayed here in my book
31:16search template so that they get
31:19published to my digital garden and I can
31:21have my favorite quotes listed here
31:22rather than all of my book notes. So,
31:24the way I do this is I take fleeting
31:26notes in either my Goodreads note or my
31:29book source template. I don't need to
31:31deal with organization because the
31:32bookspace automatically organizes
31:34everything for me with the automatic
31:36property generation using the Goodreads
31:38web clipper or using the book search
31:40plug-in template. So, it's very easy for
31:42me to just add in a few missing pieces
31:44of information as I need to. For
31:45example, I can just go through and add
31:47an Lamont here easily as the author for
31:50bird by bird and I can find Mihi and add
31:53him here. It's very easy for me to go
31:54through and update the organization once
31:57it's already in the base. Then we get to
31:58the distill section, which is where I
32:00would go through and do that extraction
32:02process where you can go and you can
32:03highlight sections of information that
32:05you think is the most relevant and
32:07extract it into its own quote, which by
32:09the way, I would also add a page number
32:10so that I can go back and find it again,
32:11which is kind of what I've been doing
32:12here where I keep track of the pages in
32:15text as I go. And then finally, once
32:16I've gone through and extracted those
32:18quotes and added them into the embedded
32:20view of my map of the book so that it
32:23can automatically populate this data
32:24view table and then be displayed in my
32:26digital garden. All I have to do is go
32:28find that quote and just toggle DG
32:30publish equals true and then published
32:32to my digital garden. So that shows you
32:33the full workflow of being able to
32:35capture notes in a source note, organize
32:37it automatically into the books base, go
32:39through the notes and extract quote by
32:41quote atomic notes to keep track of my
32:44favorite parts of that book. and then
32:45optionally publish it into the digital
32:47garden map that I share as part of my
32:49blog.
32:51I hope that this gives you an idea on
32:53how you can build your own personal
32:55library inside of Obsidian. There's no
32:57end to the properties you can add, the
32:59templates you can build, and how you can
33:01tie it all together in bases to
33:03streamline the organization of your
33:04booknotes and track your reading
33:06progress. All of this contributes into a
33:08personal library of knowledge in
33:10Obsidian. If you found this video
33:11helpful, please consider hyping and
33:13subscribing. Your support means much
33:14more than you know. A reminder that if
33:16you want a copy of this books bases kit
33:18that I've constructed here along with
33:20some other features that I've added
33:21afterwards, please consider joining my
33:23membership or getting the kit from my
33:24website. Thank you. Also, if you'd like
33:26to see me build any other type of base
33:28using Obsidian bases, let me know what
33:31you're interested in and I can make a
33:32dedicated video on it. I'm also happy to
33:34answer any questions in the comments, so
33:36please feel free to leave them there. If
33:37you want to learn more about how I
33:38structure my Obsidian vault using
33:40Molecular Zealcastin and generally just
33:42how I structure my personal knowledge
33:44management system, I recommend checking
33:46out my Obsidian and PKM playlist. Thanks
33:48again for watching and I will see you in
33:49the next video.

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