The social layer
for Obsidian.
Turn your vault into a living profile that updates itself every day. Then connect with friends' vaults: share notes, ask for help, offer help, and give gravity to the people who show up for you.
Private by default. Nothing leaves your vault unless you choose it. Privacy Policy
A living profile
Caldera reads your vault on your device and builds a profile page: a daily journal you can flip through, an activity score, topics, and the notes you choose to share.
A reason to check in
Every morning: what you did yesterday, how it compares to the day before, your streak, and your best days. Bring your own data from calendar, email or git.
Friends between vaults
Add friends by handle. Share any note as an end-to-end encrypted card; it lands in their vault as a normal note and updates when you edit it.
Asks and offers
Post what you could use help with and what you can help with. Put a bounty of help credits on an ask and award it to whoever helps.
Gravity, positive only
No likes, no downvotes. Give gravity to people who helped you. It fades over a month, so recent help counts most.
Open protocol
Your identity is a key that lives in your vault, not an account. Everything is signed. Self-host your page or your own hub.
Private by default
- Your vault never uploads. Caldera builds your profile on your device and sends only the finished page.
- You choose every section. Each part of the profile has its own switch. Notes are public only if you add
caldera: public. - Preview first. See exactly what visitors will see before anything is published.
- Shared notes are end-to-end encrypted. The hub only stores ciphertext it cannot read.
- Topics are allow-listed. Only tags you list are ever counted, so private names never appear.
- No telemetry. The plugin talks only to the hub you choose, only when you act.
Install
One paste. Your AI does the rest.
Works with Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, or any AI agent that can edit files on your computer.
- 1Copy the promptOne click, below.
- 2Paste it into your agentIt installs Caldera and sets up your daily journal.
- 3Restart ObsidianClick Create identity. Your key never passes through the AI.
- Installs the plugin
- Writes a daily journal entry
- Counts your activity
- Privacy rules override everything
- Never touches your key
You are helping me run Caldera, the social layer for my Obsidian vault (https://caldera.social). Caldera builds a public profile page from my vault. Follow these instructions exactly.
Vault: <ABSOLUTE PATH TO MY OBSIDIAN VAULT>
(If I did not fill this in, find my vault yourself: it is the folder that contains a .obsidian folder. If there is more than one, ask me which.)
My public page: https://caldera.social/@<my handle>/
## 1. Install the plugin
1. Download https://caldera.social/download/caldera-0.1.0.zip and unzip it into "<ABSOLUTE PATH TO MY OBSIDIAN VAULT>/.obsidian/plugins/caldera/" so that folder contains main.js, manifest.json and styles.css.
2. Add "caldera" to the JSON array in "<ABSOLUTE PATH TO MY OBSIDIAN VAULT>/.obsidian/community-plugins.json" (create the file as ["caldera"] if it does not exist). Do not remove other entries.
3. Tell me to restart Obsidian. If Obsidian asks, I turn off Restricted mode (Settings -> Community plugins -> Turn on community plugins) and make sure Caldera is switched on. Then I open Settings -> Caldera, click "Create identity", export the recovery key, pick a handle, and choose which sections are public. Do NOT create the identity, read the plugin's data.json, or handle my keys yourself - that file holds my private key.
## 2. Daily routine (run once a day, in the morning, for YESTERDAY's date; I will schedule you)
A. Journal entry. Open (or create) yesterday's daily note, named YYYY-MM-DD.md, wherever my daily notes live. Add these frontmatter properties, keeping everything already in the note:
caldera_headline: one sentence, the shape of the day
caldera_focus: 2-4 short items, what I worked on
caldera_wins: 1-3 short items, what got done
caldera_themes: 1-3 single words
Write them from my notes, calendar, sent email, commits and AI sessions for that day - whatever you can access.
B. Activity counts. Update "<ABSOLUTE PATH TO MY OBSIDIAN VAULT>/Caldera/activity.json" (create it if missing). Format:
{ "days": [ { "date": "YYYY-MM-DD", "meetings": 0, "emails": 0, "prompts": 0, "commits": 0, "docs": 0 } ] }
One object per date: replace that date's object if it exists, keep the last 60 days, and only include counts you can actually measure (omit the rest - never guess). meetings = calendar events attended, emails = emails I sent, prompts = AI prompts I sent, commits = git commits I authored, docs = documents/attachments I produced or filed. Notes are counted by the plugin itself.
C. Publish. If Caldera auto-publish is on (Settings -> Caldera -> Auto-publish every N hours), you are done. Otherwise ask me to run "Caldera: Publish my profile" from the command palette.
## 3. Privacy rules (these override everything above)
Everything you write in the caldera_* fields and in Caldera/activity.json is PUBLIC on the internet. So:
- No names of people, companies, clients, investors, deals, or products that are not already public on my page.
- No money amounts, prices, valuations, metrics, health, legal, family, location or travel details.
- No email addresses, phone numbers, URLs to private docs, or anything copied from email bodies.
- Describe work by its public theme instead ("closed out a design review", "shipped a release"), and only use topics among the tags I allow-listed in Settings -> Caldera -> Public topics.
- If you are unsure whether something is private, leave it out. An empty field is fine.
- Never write to any other part of the vault, never change notes' privacy markings (caldera: public / friends), never touch .obsidian/plugins/caldera/data.json.
## 4. Check your work
After each run, tell me in two lines what you wrote for that day, and anything you skipped because it looked private.
Already installed? In Obsidian, run Caldera: Copy AI agent setup prompt for a version pre-filled with your vault path, handle and topics.
Prefer to install by hand?
1 · Get the plugin
- Download caldera-0.1.0.zip.
- In your vault, open the hidden folder
.obsidian/plugins/and create a folder namedcaldera. On a Mac, Cmd+Shift+. shows hidden folders in Finder. - Unzip into it: you should see
main.js,manifest.jsonandstyles.css. - Restart Obsidian, then Settings → Community plugins → turn on Caldera.
Once listed in the community directory: Settings → Community plugins → Browse → search Caldera.
2 · Set it up
- Settings → Caldera → Create identity, then Export recovery key and keep it safe.
- Pick a handle and name, and optionally an avatar and banner from your vault.
- Choose what's public with the section switches and Public topics.
- Run Caldera: Preview my public profile, then Publish my profile.
- Open the flame icon panel to add friends and give gravity.
Optional · after setup
Make it richer
A second prompt that suggests notes to show, topics, activity sources, a 14-day journal backfill, and asks and offers. It asks before anything becomes public.
- Suggests public notes
- Picks safe topics
- Connects activity sources
- Backfills 14 days
- Asks before publishing
Help me make my Caldera profile richer. Caldera (https://caldera.social) builds a public profile page from my Obsidian vault.
Vault: <ABSOLUTE PATH TO MY OBSIDIAN VAULT>
(If I did not fill this in, find my vault yourself: it is the folder that contains a .obsidian folder. If there is more than one, ask me which.)
Work through these one at a time. Anything that would become PUBLIC needs my explicit yes first: show me exactly what you propose, wait for my answer, then make only the approved changes.
1. Public notes. Find 3-8 notes that would be good to show publicly: evergreen essays, how-tos, reading notes, overviews of work that is already public. Skip anything about people, clients, deals, money, health, family or unannounced work. List them with one line each on why. After I approve, add "caldera: public" to the frontmatter of the approved notes only. The page shows each note's title and first paragraph, so check that first paragraph too.
2. Notes friends can receive. Suggest notes I might want to share with friends as encrypted cards (frameworks, checklists, templates). After I approve, add "caldera: friends" to their frontmatter. These are not public; only friends I pick receive them.
3. Public topics. List my 10 most-used tags that are safe to show publicly (no client, company or people tags), with a short label for each. I will add them myself in Settings -> Caldera -> Public topics. Do not edit plugin settings.
4. Activity sources. Set up a daily scheduled job (cron, launchd, Task Scheduler, or your own scheduler) that writes COUNTS ONLY for yesterday into "<ABSOLUTE PATH TO MY OBSIDIAN VAULT>/Caldera/activity.json" in this format, replacing that date's entry and keeping 60 days:
{ "days": [ { "date": "YYYY-MM-DD", "meetings": 0, "emails": 0, "prompts": 0, "commits": 0, "docs": 0 } ] }
Use the sources I actually have: calendar events attended, emails I sent, AI prompts I sent, git commits I authored, documents I produced. Only numbers - never titles, subjects, names or contents. Tell me which sources you connected and which you could not. If a daily journal routine already writes this file, extend it instead of adding a second writer.
5. Backfill the journal. For each of the last 14 days that has activity, add caldera_headline, caldera_focus, caldera_wins and caldera_themes to that day's daily note (YYYY-MM-DD.md), following the privacy rules below. Show me the 14 entries before writing them.
6. Asks and offers. Draft 2 asks ("I could use help with...") and 2 offers ("I can help with...") that fit what I work on. I will post the ones I like with the commands "Caldera: Post an ask" and "Caldera: Post an offer".
7. Finish. Tell me to run "Caldera: Preview my public profile", check it, then "Caldera: Publish my profile".
Privacy rules (these override everything above):
- Never put names of people, companies, clients, investors, deals or unannounced products into anything public.
- No money amounts, prices, valuations, metrics, health, legal, family, location or travel details.
- No email addresses, phone numbers, or links to private documents.
- If you are unsure whether something is private, leave it out.
- Never read or edit .obsidian/plugins/caldera/data.json - it holds my private key.
- Never remove or change an existing "caldera:" marking without asking me.
In Obsidian: Caldera: Copy AI prompt: make my profile richer.
Or do it by hand: what each convention does
| Add this | To get |
|---|---|
caldera: public in a note's properties | The note listed on your profile (title and first paragraph) |
caldera_headline, caldera_focus, caldera_wins in a daily note named YYYY-MM-DD | That day's journal entry |
Caldera/activity.json | Daily counts from outside tools (meetings, emails sent, commits, AI sessions) for your score |
| Command: Share this note with a friend | An encrypted copy in their vault, under Caldera/Inbox/ |
| Commands: Post an ask / Post an offer | The help exchange on your profile and the hub |
Publishing from a server or a scheduled job: the Caldera CLI in the repository (packages/cli, caldera publish --vault /path/to/vault) uses the same settings and identity.
Questions
Is it free?
Yes. The plugin, your profile and friends are free and open source. Optional paid features (like a hosted AI journal and custom domains) may come later.
Who can see my notes?
Only what you publish. Your vault is read on your device; Caldera publishes the sections you switch on and notes you mark caldera: public. Notes you share with a friend are encrypted so only that friend can read them.
What are help credits?
Points you earn by helping people with their asks. Everyone starts with 100. They have no cash value and can't be bought or sold.
Does it work on mobile?
Yes, the plugin runs on Obsidian desktop and mobile.
Can I host it myself?
Yes. Use Export profile to a vault folder to get a static site for any host, or run your own hub. The protocol is open.
How do I delete my profile?
In Obsidian, run Caldera: Delete my profile from the hub. Your page, friendships, asks, offers, gravity and credits on the hub are erased. Your vault is never touched.
What if I lose my device?
Your identity is a key in your vault's plugin settings. Export the recovery key when you set up, and import it on a new device.