TreeFocus for Obsidian

Highlight, dim and style the files and folders in your Obsidian file explorer - automatically, with rules, or item by item.

A busy vault makes every file look equally important. TreeFocus lets you turn down the noise (template, attachment and archive folders) and bring the signal forward (your active projects) - so your file explorer reflects what actually matters to you.

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Contents

• Features
• Installation
• How it works
• Matching rules
• Per-item overrides
• Style presets
• Compatibility
• Contributing
• Support
• License

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Features

• 💡 Highlight the files and folders you care about.
• 🥱 Dim the ones you rarely touch.
• 🧰 Rule-based styling - match by name or full path using equals, contains, starts with, ends with, or regex.
• 🖱️ Per-item overrides - right-click any item to set its mode explicitly, overriding all rules.
• 🎨 Style presets - choose how highlight and dim actually look (Default, Fancy, Delight).
• 📱 Desktop and mobile - works on every platform Obsidian runs on.
• 🤝 Plays nicely with the Iconize plugin.

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Installation

From within Obsidian (recommended)

1. Open Settings → Community plugins and make sure Restricted mode is off.
2. Click Browse, search for TreeFocus.
3. Click Install, then Enable.

Manual installation

1. Download main.js, manifest.json and styles.css from the latest release.
2. Copy them into <your-vault>/.obsidian/plugins/treefocus/.
3. Reload Obsidian and enable TreeFocus under Settings → Community plugins.

Requires Obsidian 1.2.0 or newer.

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How it works

Every item in the file explorer resolves to exactly one focus mode:

Mode	Meaning
💡 Highlight	Make the item stand out.
🥱 Dim	Fade the item into the background.
🍆 Default	Leave it as Obsidian renders it.

A mode is assigned in one of two ways, in order of priority:

1. Per-item override - set explicitly via the right-click context menu (always wins).
2. Matching rules - the first rule whose matcher matches the item.

The chosen mode is then rendered according to your selected style preset.

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Matching rules

A rule says "apply this mode to every item that matches this condition". Each rule combines a match method with a match context, plus optional exclusions.

Match method

Method	Matches when the value...
Equals	is exactly equal
Contains	appears anywhere
Starts with	is a prefix
Ends with	is a suffix
Regex	matches the regular expression

Match context

Context	Matched against
Name	the file or folder name
Path	the full vault-relative path

Default rules

TreeFocus ships with a few sensible defaults you can edit or remove:

• 🥱 Dim everything whose name starts with _ (e.g. _templates, _attachments).
• 🥱 Dim everything whose name starts with . (hidden / system items).
• 💡 Highlight everything whose name starts with ! (e.g. !inbox, !active-project).

Tip: prefixing a folder with _ or ! is a quick, zero-config way to dim or highlight it.

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Per-item overrides

Right-click any file or folder in the explorer to set its mode explicitly. This overrides every matching rule and can be reset at any time.

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Style presets

The focus modes are abstract - the style preset decides how Highlight and Dim are actually drawn. Pick the one that fits your theme:

Preset	Look
Default	Subtle, theme-friendly emphasis and fading.
Fancy	Stronger, more decorative styling.
Delight	A little extra flair.

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Compatibility

TreeFocus is fully compatible with Iconize (obsidian-iconize) - your folder icons and TreeFocus styling work side by side. Big thanks to @FlorianWoelki for that excellent plugin. 🎉

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Contributing

Pull requests are very welcome. If you have an improvement or a fix, please open a PR or an issue.

And do not talk yourself out of it because you think you are "not skilled enough" - we are all beginners, all the time. 🙂

Development

pnpm install          # install dependencies (pnpm 11+)
pnpm run dev          # watch + rebuild on change
pnpm run build        # type-check and produce a production build

Commits follow Conventional Commits (enforced by commitlint); releases are cut automatically by semantic-release.

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Support

If TreeFocus is useful to you, consider supporting its development - a feature request, a pull request, or a small coffee all help. Thank you!

• Buy Me a Coffee
• GitHub Sponsors
• PayPal
• Homepage

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License

MIT © iOSonntag

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_{Disclaimer: "TreeFocusMode™" is a tongue-in-cheek joke - a little parody of trademark overzealousness. No trademarks were harmed in the making of this plugin. Have a great day! 😄}