TsumugiMark

TsumugiMark

TsumugiMark is a vertical writing plugin for Obsidian. It lets you open any Markdown note in a dedicated vertical-writing pane — ideal for composing novels, screenplays, and other Japanese texts.

Note: This plugin is in beta. Some features may not be fully stable. Always test on a copy of your vault before using on important files.

Features

Core Features

• Vertical Writing View: Opens the active Markdown file in a separate pane using CSS writing-mode: vertical-rl (or vertical-lr).
• Live Preview: Changes saved in the standard Markdown editor are reflected in the vertical pane in real time.
• Edit in Vertical View: Type and edit directly in the vertical pane. Changes are auto-saved back to the original Markdown file.
• Heading Creation: Type # (or ##, ###, up to ######) at the start of a paragraph and press Space to instantly convert it to the corresponding heading level.
• Ruby Character Support: Supports furigana in seven syntaxes (Kakuyomu / Narou / Aozora / Denden Markdown). The original syntax of each ruby is preserved when the file is saved.
• Line Count Bar: Optionally shows the number of lines (displayed columns) and the current line at the top of the pane.
• Character Count: Displays the total character count in the status bar. Selecting text also shows the selection count.
• Auto-Open in Vertical Mode: Optionally open every Markdown note automatically in the vertical editor without clicking the toolbar button each time.
• Customization: Font family, font size, line height, letter spacing, writing direction, column alignment, auto-indent, and character count mode are all configurable from the settings panel.

Advanced Features

• Typewriter Mode: Keeps the line you are editing fixed at the center of the screen. The view scrolls automatically as you type, so your visual focus never moves.
• Writing Direction: Switch between right-to-left (traditional Japanese vertical writing) and left-to-right from settings.
• Column Alignment: Static placement of the whole text block on screen — Left, Center, or Right. This is a fixed layout option; it does not follow the cursor (use Typewriter Mode for that).
• Protected Blocks: Syntax that cannot be represented in vertical writing (tables, code fences, callouts, frontmatter, wikilinks, embeds, footnotes) is preserved verbatim, so opening and saving a note never destroys it.
• Auto-Save: Edits are saved automatically 2 seconds after you stop typing. Closing the pane also triggers an immediate save.
• Markdown Round-Trip: The vertical editor converts Markdown to HTML for display and back to Markdown on save, preserving headings, bold, italic, ruby, hard line breaks, and blank lines.
• External Edit Detection: If the underlying Markdown file is modified outside the vertical editor (e.g. in the standard editor), the vertical pane reloads automatically.

How to Use

Opening the Vertical Editor

Method 1 — Toolbar button

1. Open any Markdown file.
2. Click the notebook icon that appears in the top-right action bar of the editor pane.
3. The screen splits and the vertical editor opens on the right.

Method 2 — Command palette

1. Press Cmd/Ctrl + P to open the command palette.
2. Run TsumugiMark: Open vertical editor.

Creating Headings Directly in the Vertical Editor

You can add headings without switching back to the Markdown source view.

1. Place your cursor in an empty paragraph (press Enter to create one if needed).
2. Type # for H1, ## for H2, ### for H3, and so on (up to ###### for H6).
3. Press Space — the paragraph is immediately converted to the corresponding heading element.
4. Type your heading text. The heading is saved to the Markdown file as # Title, ## Title, etc. on the next auto-save.

Auto-Open in Vertical Mode

When enabled, every Markdown note you open is automatically displayed in the vertical editor — no need to click the toolbar button each time.

1. Open Settings → TsumugiMark.
2. Toggle Open all notes in vertical mode on.
3. Open any Markdown note — it will switch to the vertical editor automatically.

If a vertical editor pane is already open for the same file, clicking that file's tab will bring the existing pane into focus instead of creating a new one.

Customizing Writing Direction

1. Open Settings → TsumugiMark.
2. Set Writing direction to:
   • Right to left (traditional) — the default; columns flow from right to left, as in traditional Japanese vertical writing.
   • Left to right — columns flow from left to right.

Adjusting Column Alignment

1. Open Settings → TsumugiMark.
2. Set Column alignment to Left, Center, or Right.
   • Right (default) is the natural starting position for right-to-left vertical writing.
   • Center is useful when you prefer the text to sit in the middle of the screen.
   • Left is natural for left-to-right vertical writing.

Using Typewriter Mode

1. Open Settings → TsumugiMark and turn on Typewriter mode (or run the Toggle typewriter mode command).
2. The column containing the cursor is scrolled to the center of the pane as you type.
   • Only scroll when typing — recenter only on input, not when you move the cursor with clicks or arrow keys.
   • Highlight active paragraph — tint the paragraph that contains the cursor.
3. Scrolling with the mouse wheel temporarily suspends the follow behavior; it resumes as soon as you type again.
4. While an IME conversion is in progress the view is not moved, so Japanese input never makes the screen shake.

Adding Ruby (Furigana)

Type any of the supported syntaxes and the editor converts it into a <ruby> element as soon as you close the bracket:

The parenthesis syntaxes require a pipe (｜ or |). Parentheses without a pipe — for example 固有名詞（こゆうめいし） — are left as plain text on purpose, because they cannot be told apart from ordinary parenthetical writing. Angle brackets 《》 are auto-detected without a pipe.

Mixed full-width / half-width pipes and parentheses (e.g. ｜固有名詞(こゆうめいし)) are restored exactly as you typed them.

You can also select text in the vertical editor and run the Insert ruby command to add ruby to the selection.

The syntax you used is stored on the element and restored on save, so a file written with {漢字|かんじ} never comes back as ｜漢字《かんじ》.

Settings

Access all settings via Settings → TsumugiMark.

Important Notes

Beta Status

This plugin is in beta. Layout may break in edge cases — always keep a backup of your vault when trying new features.

Heading Syntax

The # + Space heading shortcut only applies when the entire paragraph contains nothing but # characters. For example:

• ### + Space → H3 ✓
• ## Hello + Space at the end → no conversion (already has content) ✓

Writing Direction and Alignment

For right-to-left (vertical-rl) writing, Right alignment places the first column at the right edge of the screen, which is the conventional reading position. Choosing Left alignment with vertical-rl will place the first column at the left edge, which may feel unconventional.

Round-Trip Fidelity

The Markdown ↔ HTML conversion handles headings, bold, italic, ruby, emphasis dots, line breaks, blank lines, lists, task lists, and strikethrough.

Syntax that cannot be laid out vertically is protected instead: frontmatter, tables, fenced code blocks, callouts, wikilinks, embeds, and footnotes keep their original Markdown source and are restored verbatim on save.

• Protected blocks (tables, code, callouts, footnote definitions) are shown as read-only horizontal chips. Edit them in the standard Markdown editor.
• Deleting a protected block deletes the whole block, including the syntax it holds.
• The escape sequences \[\[, \]\], \[^ and \[! are un-escaped on save so that links typed inside the vertical editor keep working. Literal text that intentionally contains those sequences is not preserved.
• A single newline inside a paragraph is written back as a hard line break (two trailing spaces).
• Multi-line footnote definitions are protected on their first line only.

Version History

1.1.0

• Typewriter mode — the line being edited is kept at the center of the screen; the view follows the cursor as you type, with IME-safe behavior, manual-scroll suspension, and edge padding so the first and last columns can be centered too
• Highlight active paragraph and Only scroll when typing options for typewriter mode, plus a Toggle typewriter mode command
• Line count bar — optional bar showing the number of displayed columns and the current line
• Ruby syntax expansion — seven ruby syntaxes plus Kakuyomu emphasis dots 《《…》》; the original syntax is now preserved on save, live conversion happens while typing, and a new Insert ruby command wraps the selection
• Protected blocks — frontmatter, tables, code fences, callouts, wikilinks, embeds, and footnotes are no longer destroyed by opening and saving a note in the vertical editor
• Fixed blank-line markers being injected into code fences
• Added strikethrough and task list round-trip support, and normalized list markers to - item

1.0.2

• Heading creation in the vertical editor — type # (or ##–######) at the start of a paragraph and press Space to convert it to a heading; headings are saved as proper Markdown syntax (# Title)
• Auto-open in vertical mode — new toggle in settings opens every Markdown note in the vertical editor automatically
• Writing direction setting — choose right-to-left (default) or left-to-right vertical writing
• Column alignment setting — position text columns at the left, center, or right of the screen
• Fixed scroll being blocked when column alignment was set to Right
• Fixed headings and other block elements not converting correctly to Markdown on save (was caused by passing HTMLElement directly to TurndownService instead of outerHTML)
• Fixed auto-open scroll not working: moved flex/overflow handling to a dedicated inner scroll container so Obsidian's .view-content styles do not interfere
• Switched auto-open trigger from file-open to active-leaf-change for reliable activation

1.0.1

• Improved ruby annotation parsing — fixed the start() detection function and added iteration mark (々, 〆, etc.) support
• Refactored EditorManager for more reliable cursor positioning and paragraph splitting
• Improved FileManager: more robust blank-line round-tripping and external-edit detection
• Improved heading and empty-line CSS for cleaner vertical layout
• Fixed various editor and save-cycle bugs

1.0.0

• Initial release
• Vertical writing view with writing-mode: vertical-rl
• Live preview of changes from the standard Markdown editor
• Direct editing in the vertical pane with auto-save
• Ruby character support (|漢字《かんじ》 and auto-detect)
• Character count in the status bar (including selection count)
• Font, size, line height, letter spacing, and auto-indent customization
• Characters-per-column setting with automatic max-width calculation

License

This plugin is released under the MIT License.