wiki-digest

Wiki Digest — Knowledge Newsletter Generator

You are generating a human-readable digest of recent wiki activity: what was learned, what was updated, what themes are emerging, and what's worth reviewing. This skill summarizes knowledge, not sources — think of it as a weekly review session, not an ingestion status report.

Before You Start

1. Resolve config — follow the Config Resolution Protocol in llm-wiki/SKILL.md (walk up CWD for .env → ~/.obsidian-wiki/config → prompt setup). This gives OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH and OBSIDIAN_LINK_FORMAT.
2. Parse the period from the user's request:

• "daily" / "today" / "yesterday" → last 24 hours
• "weekly" / "this week" / no argument (default) → last 7 days
• "monthly" / "this month" → last 30 days
• ISO date like "since 2026-05-01" → pages updated since that date
• Explicit number like "last 14 days" → that many days

1. Read $OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH/log.md — last 200 lines — for entries within the period (timestamps are ISO-8601 prefixed lines).
2. Read $OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH/hot.md for current session context.
3. If $OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH/_insights.md exists, read its Anchor Pages table — you'll use it later to identify which new pages became hubs.

Step 1: Collect Pages Active in the Period

Glob all .md files under $OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH. Skip special/system files:

• index.md, log.md, hot.md, AGENTS.md, _insights.md
• Anything under _meta/, _archives/, _raw/
• Journal digest pages themselves (journal/digest-*.md)

For each remaining page, read its frontmatter:

• created — when the page was first written
• updated — when it was last modified

Classify:

• New pages: created is within the period
• Updated pages: updated is within the period but created is before it
• Unchanged: neither date falls in the period → skip

If fewer than 5 pages were active, note it and offer to widen: "Only 3 pages were active in the last 7 days — want a monthly digest instead?" Stop here unless the user says to continue.

For each active page, collect: title, category, tags, summary (frontmatter field), lifecycle, any ^[ambiguous] or ^[inferred] markers in the body.

Step 2: Identify Themes

From all active pages' tags, tally theme frequency:

For each tag across new + updated pages:
  count how many active pages carry it
Sort descending, take top 5

Also read $OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH/_meta/taxonomy.md (if it exists). Flag any tag from step 1 that does not appear in the taxonomy — these are new vocabulary words that emerged this period.

Note which categories grew most (concepts/, entities/, skills/, synthesis/, references/, etc.).

Step 3: Find Notable New Connections

Scan new and updated pages for cross-category wikilinks — links that bridge different knowledge layers. These are the most intellectually interesting outputs of the period.

For each active page, extract all [[wikilink]] targets. Classify each link by the target's category prefix. Flag links that cross categories (e.g., a concepts/ page linking to an entities/ page, or a synthesis/ page bridging two topics).

Rank candidates by interestingness:

• +3 if the link is across two categories that rarely connect (use _insights.md bridge data if available)
• +2 if the target page is a top-10 hub (per _insights.md anchors)
• +2 if the link appears in a synthesis/ page (deliberate cross-cutting)
• +1 if the source page is marked ^[inferred] (synthesized connection, not directly stated)

Take the top 3–5 connections. Write each as a plain-English sentence: not just "A → B" but why the connection is interesting.

Step 4: Surface Open Threads

Scan active pages and _raw/ for unresolved work:

• Drafts: pages with lifecycle: draft or lifecycle: stub
• Ambiguous claims: count ^[ambiguous] markers across all active pages (don't list every one — just the count and which pages have the most)
• Unstaged notes: count files in $OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH/_raw/ (anything here hasn't been promoted)
• Taxonomy gaps: tags from Step 2 that aren't in _meta/taxonomy.md

Step 5: Choose Recommended Re-reads

From the existing (pre-period) pages, identify 2–3 worth revisiting given this week's new context.

Heuristic: find pre-period pages that share the most tags with the active pages from Step 1. These are foundational pages whose topic was extended this period — the new pages build on them but the user may not have revisited the foundation.

Also include any pre-period page that now has 2+ new incoming links from active pages (it just became more connected — a sign it's load-bearing).

Write each recommendation with a concrete reason: "[[concepts/attention-mechanism]] — your foundational page; three new papers ingested this week all extend it", not just the page title.

Step 6: Generate the Digest

Produce a structured, scannable markdown report. The Headlines section is the most important — it should feel like the opening of a good newsletter, synthesizing actual insight rather than listing page names.

Apply the link format from llm-wiki/SKILL.md (Link Format section) using OBSIDIAN_LINK_FORMAT. Default is [[wikilink]].

# Wiki Digest — [Period Label]
> [N new pages · M updated pages · period: YYYY-MM-DD to YYYY-MM-DD]

## Headlines

- [Concrete insight #1 — synthesize the actual knowledge, not just "learned about X"]
- [Concrete insight #2]
- [Concrete insight #3]

## New Knowledge

### New pages ([count])
| Page | Category | Summary |
|---|---|---|
| [[concepts/foo]] | concept | One-sentence summary from frontmatter |
| [[entities/bar]] | entity | One-sentence summary |

### Notable updates ([count])
| Page | What changed |
|---|---|
| [[skills/react-hooks]] | Added patterns for useCallback with async effects |

*(If no updates, omit this subsection.)*

## Emerging Themes

- **#[tag]** ([N pages]) — [One sentence on why this topic was active]
- **#[tag]** ([N pages]) — [...]
- **#[NEW TAG]** ([N pages]) ⭐ *New vocabulary — not yet in taxonomy*

Most active category: **[category/]** ([N pages added or updated])

## Key Connections Made

- [[concepts/A]] → [[entities/B]] — [Plain-English reason this connection is interesting]
- [[synthesis/X]] created — bridges [[concepts/Y]] and [[concepts/Z]] for the first time
- *(up to 5 connections)*

## Open Threads

- **Drafts to compile** ([count]): [[concepts/foo]], [[concepts/bar]] — still in draft lifecycle
- **Ambiguous claims**: [N] `^[ambiguous]` markers across [M] pages — run `/wiki-synthesize` to resolve
- **Unstaged notes**: [N] files in `_raw/` — run `/wiki-ingest _raw/` to promote them
- **Taxonomy gaps**: Tags `#newtag1`, `#newtag2` used but not in taxonomy — run `/tag-taxonomy`

*(Omit any subsection where count is 0.)*

## Recommended Re-reads

- [[concepts/X]] — [Specific reason: "3 new papers this week all extend this concept"]
- [[synthesis/Y]] — [Specific reason: "2 new pages created this week reference it"]
- [[skills/Z]] — [Specific reason: "now has 4 new incoming links — it's become a hub"]

---
*Generated by wiki-digest · [TIMESTAMP] · [N pages scanned in [VAULT_PATH]]*

Visibility: If a page is tagged visibility/pii, exclude it from all tables and connection lists (but count it in the totals, noted as "+ N private"). If the user explicitly says "include private pages" or "full digest", include them normally.

Step 7: Output & Optionally Save

Default (chat output): Print the digest directly. At the end, ask: "Want me to save this as journal/digest-YYYY-MM-DD.md?"

If user prefixed with "save" or "write" (e.g., /wiki-digest save or "generate and save my weekly digest"):

• Write to $OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH/journal/digest-YYYY-MM-DD.md (weekly/monthly) or journal/digest-YYYY-MM-DD-daily.md (daily)
• Add frontmatter:

  ---
  title: "Wiki Digest — [Period Label]"
  category: journal
  tags: [digest, meta/review]
  sources: []
  created: TIMESTAMP
  updated: TIMESTAMP
  summary: "Weekly knowledge digest: [N new, M updated pages]. Top themes: [tag1], [tag2]."
  ---

• Update index.md with the new entry under Journal
• Do not add to .manifest.json (digests aren't source ingestions)

Either way, append to log.md:

- [TIMESTAMP] DIGEST period="7d" new_pages=N updated_pages=M themes=T connections=C saved=false

Edge Cases

Notes

• Headlines are the payoff. Don't list page titles — synthesize the actual learning. If someone learned about attention mechanisms this week, the headline should capture the insight, not just say "added 3 transformer pages".
• Be concrete about re-reads. "This page is relevant" is useless. "3 of this week's papers all cite the same claim in this page" is actionable.
• This skill only reads. The only writes are the optional journal page, and the log.md append. It does not modify existing wiki pages.
• Don't duplicate wiki-status. If the user asks "what needs ingesting" or "what's the delta", route to wiki-status. This skill answers "what did I learn", not "what's pending".

QMD Refresh After Vault Writes

QMD is a search index, not the source of truth. If $QMD_WIKI_COLLECTION is empty or unset, skip this step. Run it only after this skill has written or rewritten vault markdown. If QMD refresh fails, do not roll back the vault changes; report the QMD status separately.

Use $QMD_CLI if set; otherwise use qmd.

${QMD_CLI:-qmd} update

If the output says vectors are needed or embeddings may be stale, run:

${QMD_CLI:-qmd} embed

Verify the collection with either:

${QMD_CLI:-qmd} ls "$QMD_WIKI_COLLECTION"

or, when a specific page path is known:

${QMD_CLI:-qmd} get "qmd://$QMD_WIKI_COLLECTION/<page>.md" -l 5

Record one of:

• QMD refreshed: update + embed + verified
• QMD refreshed: update only + verified
• QMD skipped: QMD_WIKI_COLLECTION unset
• QMD skipped: qmd CLI unavailable
• QMD failed: <short error summary>