Task Note

Task Notes

ABSOLUTE CONSTRAINTS — NEVER VIOLATE

1. NEVER edit structured fields (status, priority, dates, links, or any metadata) by writing to the file directly. The ONLY permitted method is task.py script.
2. NEVER use grep / find / cat / ls on base/tasks — they produce incorrect results.
3. NEVER load more than one task's full content without explicit user request.
4. If task.py is unavailable or returns an error — report it to the user and STOP. Do NOT attempt manual metadata editing as a fallback. Ever.

Violating these rules silently corrupts vault consistency and breaks backlinks.

CONTEXT OVERFLOW PREVENTION: Discovery pipelines return file paths only. Never pipe discovery results to awk unless the user explicitly asks for full content. Loading 20+ tasks at once will overflow the context window.

ONLY the pipelines below are permitted for reading base/tasks.

READ / FIND — Decision Tree

Single task needed? → Use RETRIEVAL (returns full content) Multiple tasks needed? → Use DISCOVERY (returns paths only — DO NOT load content unless user asks)

Environment: → Shell available (rg, awk, xargs) → use Bash Pipeline → No shell tools → use Obsidian Fallback (requires Obsidian to be open)

RETRIEVAL — Single Task (full content)

By ID:

• Bash: rg -l0 '^id:\s*"?<ID>"?\s*$' -g "*.md" base/tasks | xargs -0 -I {} awk 'FNR==1{print "=== " FILENAME " ==="} {print}' "{}"
• Fallback: obsidian search query='/^id:\s*"?<ID>"?\s*$/'

By Title:

• Bash: rg --files --null -g "*.md" base/tasks | rg -z "<Title>" | xargs -0 -I {} awk 'FNR==1{print "=== " FILENAME " ==="} {print}' "{}"
• Fallback: obsidian search query="file:<Title>" path=base/tasks

DISCOVERY — Multiple Tasks (paths only)

By Project:

• Bash: rg -l "\[\[<Project>.*\]\]" -g "*.md" base/tasks
• Fallback: obsidian search query="[project:<Project>]" path=base/tasks

By Milestone:

• Bash: rg -l "\[\[<Milestone>.*\]\]" -g "*.md" base/tasks
• Fallback: obsidian search query="[milestone:<Milestone>]" path=base/tasks

Get project milestones:

• Bash: rg -l0 ' - task/milestone$' -g "*.md" base/tasks | xargs -0 -I {} rg -l "\[\[<Project>.*\]\]" "{}"
• Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:task/milestone [project:<Project>]" path=base/tasks

By Status:

• Bash: rg -l '^status:\s*<Status>\s*$' -g "*.md" base/tasks
• Fallback: obsidian search query='[status:<Status>]' path=base/tasks

By Priority:

• Bash: rg -l '^priority:\s*<Priority>\s*$' -g "*.md" base/tasks
• Fallback: obsidian search query='[priority:<Priority>]' path=base/tasks

By Project + Status:

• Bash: rg -l0 "\[\[<Project>.*\]\]" -g "*.md" base/tasks | xargs -0 -I {} rg -l '^status:\s*<Status>\s*$' "{}"
• Fallback: obsidian search query="[project:<Project>] [status:<Status>]" path=base/tasks

By Project + Priority:

• Bash: rg -l0 "\[\[<Project>.*\]\]" -g "*.md" base/tasks | xargs -0 -I {} rg -l '^priority:\s*<Priority>\s*$' "{}"
• Fallback: obsidian search query="[project:<Project>] [priority:<Priority>]" path=base/tasks

By Project + Status + Priority:

• Bash: rg -l0 "\[\[<Project>.*\]\]" -g "*.md" base/tasks | xargs -0 -I {} rg -l0 '^status:\s*<Status>\s*$' "{}" | xargs -0 -I {} rg -l '^priority:\s*<Priority>\s*$' "{}"
• Fallback: obsidian search query="[project:<Project>] [status:<Status>] [priority:<Priority>]" path=base/tasks

To extract IDs from discovery results, first change the preceding rg -l to rg -l0, then pipe to:

| xargs -0 -I {} rg --no-line-number -o '^id:\s*"?(.+?)"?\s*$' -r '$1' "{}"

CREATE / UPDATE

Forbidden actions

• NEVER edit status, priority, dates, links, or any metadata field directly in the file.
• NEVER use sed, awk, or any text replacement on task frontmatter.
• The ONLY permitted method to mutate structured fields is task.py.

Checklist before every UPDATE

Before running any update, confirm:

• I am using task.py — not direct file editing
• I have the task ID or exact title
• I am only changing fields the user explicitly requested

Updating a task

→ Changing note body or free-form content → edit the file directly → Changing any structured field (status, priority, dates, links, metadata) → ONLY via script:

python3 ".claude/skills/task-note/scripts/task.py" update (--id OVN-5 | --title "Title") [options]

Creating a task

python3 ".claude/skills/task-note/scripts/task.py" create --title "Title" --project "ProjectName" [options]

Script validates all field values and returns an error if a value is invalid.

If the script returns an error: report it to the user verbatim. Do NOT attempt workarounds.

Renaming a task

ONLY via Obsidian CLI (preserves vault backlinks):

obsidian rename path="<current_file_path>" name="<new_title_without_extension>"

NEVER use shell mv — breaks vault backlinks. NEVER use script --title for renaming — it is a lookup parameter, not a rename.

Options

update: only passed fields change. List fields replace entire list. If both --start and --end are passed, validation checks the new pair only. If only one of them is passed, validation checks it against the persisted opposite date.

Tags

Statuses

Priorities

Resolve Field Names

Run only if create script returns an error or user specifies explicit links.

• project
  • Bash: rg -l " - project/" -g "*.md" projects
  • Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:project"
• category
  • Bash: rg --files -g "*.md" base/categories
  • Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:system/category"
• meta
  • Bash: rg --files -g "*.md" base/_meta-notes
  • Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:system/high/meta"
• problem
  • Bash: rg --files -g "*.md" base/_problems
  • Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:system/high/problem"
• creator
  • Bash: rg --files -g "*.md" base/creators base/contacts
  • Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:creator OR tag:contact"
• production
  • Bash: rg --files -g "*.md" base/productions
  • Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:production"
• milestone
  • Bash: rg -l0 " - task/milestone" -g "*.md" base/tasks | xargs -0 rg -l "<project>"
  • Fallback: obsidian search query="tag:task/milestone [project:<project>]"