Obsidian Study Vault

An Obsidian vault for a Data Science master's program, built on PARA + Dataview + a minimal set of templates. The design goal is low maintenance: a small, fixed structure and one required habit, so the system stays useful without constant upkeep.

Curious what a filled-in vault looks like? See _meta/examples/ — a complete mirror of the structure with realistic notes. It's excluded from all real Dataview queries, so it won't pollute your dashboards.

The one rule

If it has a date, put it in the due field. Everything else you can skip. Only type and status are required frontmatter. Done.

Where do I put what?

What	Where
Quick note, no time to sort	`00_Inbox/` (clean up later)
Lecture note	`02_Courses/<semester>/<course>/lectures/`
Exercise / homework	`02_Courses/…/exercises/`
Paper / reading (course-specific)	`02_Courses/…/readings/`
Paper / book (cross-course, long-lived)	`04_Resources/papers/` or `04_Resources/books/`
Project (thesis, term paper, application)	`01_Projects/`
Long-lived knowledge (statistics, ML, …)	link via `moc:` to `03_Areas/<area>.md`
Cheatsheet, snippet	`04_Resources/cheatsheets/` or `04_Resources/snippets/`
Done / over	`05_Archive/`

Creating a new note

Cmd+N — lands in 00_Inbox/ automatically (setting: default location).
Insert a template (Cmd+P → Templates: Insert template).
Fill in at least type and status. If a date is set: due.
Once you know where it belongs: move it to the right folder.

The weekly review (Sunday, 15 min)

New note from the weekly-review.md template. Work through the five sections, done. This is the one recurring habit that keeps the vault current — it surfaces the inbox, open items, and anything with a due date.

When you've forgotten the system

Open Home.md.
Empty 00_Inbox/.
Do a weekly review.
Keep going. No need to set up something new.

Semester start ritual (5 min)

Create a new folder 02_Courses/<year>-<HWS|FSS>/ (if it doesn't exist).
Per course: sub-folder <CODE>-<slug>/ with lectures/, exercises/, readings/, exam/.
Create a Course-MOC from the course-moc.md template; filename = course code (e.g. IE-660.md).
Update the semester filter in Home.md (semester = "2026-HWS") to the new semester.

Naming conventions

Filenames: kebab-case, lowercase, no umlauts.
Lectures: YYYY-MM-DD-<slug>.md
Readings: <firstauthor>-<year>-<slug>.md
Course-MOC: <CODE>.md (short — [[IE-660]] is quick to type)
Weekly reviews: YYYY-Www.md (ISO week, e.g. 2026-W37.md)
Daily: YYYY-MM-DD.md
H1 title inside the file may be natural English (or German for personal notes) — filename is for machines, title is for humans. aliases: keeps linking convenient.

What NOT to do

❌ Don't invent new top-level folders (00_–06_ and _meta/ are enough).
❌ Don't invent new type: values.
❌ Don't "complete" frontmatter out of guilt. Optional means optional.
❌ Don't install a plugin zoo. The vault runs on Core + Dataview + Obsidian Git.
❌ No ad-hoc topic-MOCs. MOCs live only in 03_Areas/ and 02_Courses/…/<COURSE>.md.
❌ Don't store real notes under _meta/. It's vault infrastructure (templates, examples, assets) — dashboards deliberately ignore it via FROM "" AND -"_meta".

Language convention

Everything academic in English: lectures, readings, MOCs, exam prep, projects.
Personal stuff may stay in German: daily notes, project logs ("today frustrated because…"), weekly-review reflections, German admin (deadlines from Portal2, BAföG, forms).

Obsidian settings to set after setup

Options → Files & Links → Default location for new notes: 00_Inbox
Options → Files & Links → Default location for new attachments: _meta/assets
Options → Core Plugins → Templates: Template folder location = _meta/templates
Options → Core Plugins → Daily notes: New file location = 06_Daily, Template file location = _meta/templates/daily.md, Date format = YYYY-MM-DD
Options → About → On startup, open: Home.md

Recommended community plugins

Dataview — the Home dashboard won't run without it (but note-creation still works)
Obsidian Git — versioning/backup
optional later: Advanced Tables, MathJax extensions for ML/stats formulas

Frontmatter cheatsheet

type: lecture | reading | exam-prep | weekly-review | moc | project | daily | note   # required
status: inbox | active | in-progress | waiting | done | archived                     # required
created: YYYY-MM-DD
due: YYYY-MM-DD                        # ← the one discipline
course: IE-660                         # only on course notes
semester: 2026-HWS                     # only on course notes
tags: [ml, statistics]                 # kebab-case
moc: ["[[machine-learning]]"]          # links up to Areas/Course-MOCs

Vault layout at a glance

ma-ds/
├── Home.md                 ← dashboard (open this on startup)
├── README.md               ← you are here
├── 00_Inbox/               ← unsorted captures
├── 01_Projects/            ← thesis, term papers, applications
├── 02_Courses/             ← per-semester course notes
├── 03_Areas/               ← long-lived knowledge (Areas of interest)
├── 04_Resources/           ← papers, books, cheatsheets, snippets
├── 05_Archive/             ← finished / stale
├── 06_Daily/               ← daily notes
└── _meta/                  ← vault infrastructure (ignored by dashboards)
    ├── templates/          ← 9 note templates
    ├── examples/           ← a filled-in demo of the whole vault
    └── assets/             ← images, PDFs

obsidian-study-vault