Claude Code and Obsidian for running a business: the honest setup

You can run a business from an Obsidian vault with Claude Code. Keep one note per client, project and invoice, give every note a few fields, put a rules file at the root, and let Claude Code read and write the vault. It works. The cost is the tending: the structure only holds if someone keeps typing, tagging and filing, and in a do-it-yourself setup that someone is you.

This guide covers the setup that works and the part that stays your job, and then the two ways to hand that part off.

Why the combination works

Obsidian keeps your notes as plain markdown files in a folder on your own disk. Claude Code works on files. Open it in the vault and it reads and writes the same notes you do, with no API, no plugin and no export step. Each change it makes lands as text you can read.

The setup

1. Structure the vault by area. A few top folders (Clients, Projects, Money, Plans, Notes, Life) and one note per thing. One client, one note. A meeting is its own note that links to the client.

2. Give every note properties. At minimum a type, tags and a one-line description. Following OKF, the open standard for this, means any agent can read the vault, not just Claude (what OKF is).

3. Write a rules file at the root. Claude Code reads CLAUDE.md in the folder it opens. Put in it what the business is, where things live, how notes are named and which properties they need, and what Claude may and may not touch (how to write it):

   # This vault
   A one-person consulting business. One note per client, project, invoice and meeting.
   
   # Rules
   - Every new note gets type, tags and description properties.
   - File notes in the folder of their area. Never create new top folders.
   - Never edit anything under Life/.
   - Ask before deleting or renaming a note.
   

4. Add a safety net. Put the vault under git and commit before every session. Any change Claude makes is then one command away from undone, and you can read exactly what it did.

5. Automate the chores, one at a time. Good first jobs are filing the inbox into the right folders, turning meeting notes into updates on the client note, preparing your weekly review, and drafting the reminder for an unpaid invoice.

What stays your job

The setup above runs well for a while. Then the costs show up:

• The schema is only a request. CLAUDE.md is instructions, not enforcement. On a long session, or a new model, properties drift and notes land in the wrong place.
• The tidy is yours. Consistent types and tags across hundreds of notes don’t keep themselves. When a busy week skips the weekly review, the vault slides back toward a pile.
• Scope is coarse. Opened at the root, Claude Code can read the whole vault. Rules can ask it to stay out of your journal, but a rule is not a boundary.
• Recovery is manual. When a session goes wrong, you read the diff and roll it back yourself.

None of this is a reason not to do it. It’s the trade: a do-it-yourself vault costs you the tending.

Two ways to hand off the tending

Let Oknola do it. Point Oknola at the same folder. Your notes are already plain markdown, so nothing migrates. From there Oknola does the part an editor leaves to you: it types, tags and files every note, holds the structure in both directions (what an agent writes has to conform too), and keeps each agent inside the tags you allow. Every change is still plain text you can inspect and undo. See how it works, and what is available today on the roadmap.

Stay in Obsidian and keep the tending. If you’d rather stay in Obsidian, the same structure comes as an Obsidian vault from Indexed Brain, and you can start with its free Core. The tending stays with you.

Questions people ask

Will Claude Code wreck my notes?

It can, which is why the safety net matters. With git, every change is visible and reversible. With a structure that’s enforced rather than requested, a bad write gets fixed or refused before it lands.

Do I need Obsidian for this?

No. Obsidian is a good editor for a markdown folder, but the folder is what matters. Any editor, and any agent that reads files, works on the same notes.

Can I use Codex or Cursor instead of Claude Code?

Yes. They read the same folder. Name your rules file AGENTS.md and make CLAUDE.md a single line, @AGENTS.md, so every agent reads one file.