check-links

name	check-links
description	Find broken wiki-links in the vault. Read-only analysis — scans for [[links]] and verifies target files exist. No writes, no dependencies.
allowed-tools	Grep, Glob, Read
user-invocable	true

Check Links Skill

Finds broken [[wiki-links]] across your vault by extracting link targets and verifying that each target file exists. Read-only — never modifies files.

Usage

/check-links

Or ask:

• "Check for broken links in my vault"
• "Find dead wiki-links"
• "Are there any broken links?"

How to Execute

Step 1: Extract all wiki-links

Use Grep to find all [[...]] patterns in markdown files:

Grep:
  pattern: "\\[\\[([^\\]|]+)"
  glob: "*.md"
  output_mode: content
  -n: true

This captures the link target (before any | alias). Exclude .claude/ and .obsidian/ directories from results.

Step 2: Build unique target list

From the grep results, extract the unique link targets. For each match like [[My Note]] or [[My Note|display text]], the target is My Note.

Strip:

• Heading anchors: [[Note#heading]] → target is Note
• Block references: [[Note^block-id]] → target is Note
• Aliases: [[Note|alias]] → target is Note

Step 3: Verify each target exists

For each unique target, use Glob to check if a matching file exists:

Glob:
  pattern: "**/<target>.md"

A link is broken if no file matches. A link is valid if at least one file matches.

Step 4: Report results

Group broken links by source file:

## Broken Links Report

### Daily Notes/2024-01-15.md
- [[Projet Alpha]] — no matching file found
- [[Old Goal]] — no matching file found

### Projects/Project Beta.md
- [[Meeting Notes Jan]] — no matching file found

---

**Summary:** 3 broken links across 2 files (out of 45 total links checked)

Step 5: Suggest fixes

For each broken link, try to find a close match:

1. Use Glob with a partial pattern: **/*<partial-target>*.md
2. If a similar filename exists, suggest it:

   - [[Projet Alpha]] — Did you mean [[Project Alpha]]?
   

3. If no close match, just report "no matching file found"

Edge Cases

• Embedded images (![[image.png]]) — skip these, they reference attachments
• External links ([text](https://...)) — skip these, they are not wiki-links
• Template placeholders ([[{{date}}]]) — skip anything with {{ in the target
• Empty links ([[]]) — report as malformed, not broken

No Broken Links

If all links are valid:

✅ All wiki-links verified — no broken links found across X files (Y links checked)

Tips

• Run /check-links periodically to catch link rot
• After renaming files, run this to find links that need updating
• Combine with /search to find notes that reference deleted content