offdesk

name

offdesk

description

Copy markdown from any project into a Syncthing-synced Obsidian vault on phone/tablet, then pull annotated `>[!ai]` callouts back to source. Push triggers (EN) "send to offdesk", "send to phone for review", "review later", "check later"; push triggers (RU) "положи это в offdesk", "положи это в оффдеск", "посмотрю позже", "проверю позже". Pull triggers (EN) "review my offdesk notes", "check offdesk feedback"; pull triggers (RU) "посмотри оффдеск фидбэк", "проверь оффдеск".

Offdesk

User-level skill that copies markdown from any project into a Syncthing-synced Obsidian vault on a phone/tablet for off-desk reading, then pulls annotated >[!ai] callouts back to the source project.

The skill performs file copy, frontmatter merge, and grep directly — no compiled CLI tool. Manual user-setup steps (Syncthing, Obsidian Android, templates, toolbar) are documented in references/setup.md.

Vault path

Default vault root on the laptop:

~/Obsidian/offdesk/

Override: set OFFDESK_OBSIDIAN_VAULT in your shell profile (~/.zshrc or ~/.bashrc) to point at any directory. The skill reads it at every invocation; restart the shell after editing.

Every push/pull step that touches the vault resolves the root with:

VAULT_ROOT="${OFFDESK_OBSIDIAN_VAULT:-$HOME/Obsidian/offdesk}"
VAULT_ROOT="${VAULT_ROOT%/}"   # strip trailing slash for consistency

Push

Trigger phrases (any of):

• EN: "send to offdesk", "send to phone for review", "review later", "check later"
• RU: "положи это в offdesk", "положи это в оффдеск", "посмотрю позже", "проверю позже"

Procedure:

1. Resolve project root. Run git rev-parse --show-toplevel; if the command fails (not a git repo), fall back to pwd.
2. Project slug = basename "$PROJECT_ROOT".
3. Create the vault subdir on the laptop:

   VAULT_ROOT="${OFFDESK_OBSIDIAN_VAULT:-$HOME/Obsidian/offdesk}"
   VAULT_ROOT="${VAULT_ROOT%/}"   # strip trailing slash for consistency
   mkdir -p "$VAULT_ROOT/<slug>/"
   

4. Read the source markdown and parse any existing YAML frontmatter (the leading --- block, if present).
5. Merge the following keys into the existing frontmatter — do NOT prepend a second --- block, that would break YAML. If the source file has no frontmatter, create one. If it does, add/update these keys in place:
   • offdesk-source: relative path from project root to the source file.
   • offdesk-project-root: absolute path to the project root.
   • offdesk-copied-at: ISO 8601 UTC timestamp (e.g., 2026-06-14T08:30:00Z).
6. Keep all existing frontmatter keys untouched — confluence-* keys from upmark, jekyll/hugo fields, anything else. Merge, do not replace.
7. Write the merged document to:

   $VAULT_ROOT/<slug>/<filename>.md
   

   Syncthing propagates to the phone/tablet automatically.

For the YAML merge, the inline shell + python is acceptable when small; otherwise call the helper at scripts/merge-frontmatter.py:

scripts/merge-frontmatter.py \
    --src "<source.md>" \
    --dst "$VAULT_ROOT/<slug>/<filename>.md" \
    --offdesk-source "<rel-path>" \
    --offdesk-project-root "$PROJECT_ROOT"

Pull

Trigger phrases (any of):

• EN: "review my offdesk notes", "check offdesk feedback"
• RU: "посмотри оффдеск фидбэк", "проверь оффдеск"

Procedure:

1. Project slug from cwd / git rev-parse --show-toplevel (same as push step 1+2).
2. Grep for AI callouts over the per-project vault subdir:

   VAULT_ROOT="${OFFDESK_OBSIDIAN_VAULT:-$HOME/Obsidian/offdesk}"
   VAULT_ROOT="${VAULT_ROOT%/}"
   grep -nrE '^>\s*\[!ai\]' "$VAULT_ROOT/<slug>/"
   

   The regex ^>\s*\[!ai\] matches both >[!ai] and > [!ai] (no-space and with-space) — both forms render correctly in Obsidian.
3. For each hit, parse the file's YAML frontmatter to extract:
   • offdesk-source → the relative path back into the source project.
   • offdesk-project-root → the absolute project root for source-back mapping.
4. Report findings to the user in the format:

   <source-file>:<line> — <callout content>
   

   where <source-file> is the resolved path inside the originating project.
5. Confirm before modifying the source file. If the user wants Claude to apply changes (e.g., per a >[!fix] callout, or "apply that suggestion"), prompt for confirmation before editing the source. Never auto-apply.

Cleanup

If the source markdown is also pushed elsewhere (for example, back to Confluence via upmark push), strip the offdesk-only state from the document before the upstream push:

• Remove all offdesk-* keys from the frontmatter (offdesk-source, offdesk-project-root, offdesk-copied-at, and any future offdesk-* additions).
• Remove >[!ai] callouts from the body. Multi-line callouts are detected by leading > on each continuation line — strip the entire block.

The vault copies under $VAULT_ROOT/<slug>/ keep their annotations as review history; only the upstream-bound copy is cleaned.

Slug collision

Two projects with identical basenames (e.g., ~/work/foo and ~/play/foo) would collide in $VAULT_ROOT/foo/. Resolution: suffix the slug with a short hash of the project root path when a collision is detected.

Example: foo and foo-a1b2c3 (where a1b2c3 is the first 6 hex chars of a hash of the absolute project root). Use a stable hash (e.g., sha1) so the same project always maps to the same slug.

Annotation convention

• >[!ai] question for Claude — Obsidian block-level callout. Claude addresses these on pull.
• >[!todo] reminder for the user — Claude ignores. Grep pattern ^>\s*\[!todo\] is for the user, not Claude.
• Multi-line callouts: each subsequent line also starts with >. Obsidian Android auto-inserts > on Enter inside an existing callout.
• Both >[!ai] and > [!ai] (no-space and with-space) render correctly in Obsidian. The grep regex ^>\s*\[!ai\] handles both forms.

Setup

One-time per-user manual setup — Syncthing on macOS, Syncthing on Android via F-Droid, Obsidian on Android, the Templates plugin with two template files, and toolbar bindings — is documented in references/setup.md. The skill code itself does not automate any of these steps.