md2hd can use structure already present in Obsidian, Foam, Dendron, or any folder of markdown files.

What already works

[[wikilinks]] become connections. Aliases such as [[note-name|display text]] resolve to the same card.
YAML frontmatter becomes card fields.
A tags: array becomes chips.
Dataview-style fields such as owns:: [[thing]] become named connections.

Files need at least one frontmatter block to become cards.

Add a type first

Add type: to the notes that matter:

---
type: person
---

Types are names you choose: person, organization, service, claim, character, or anything else. Each type gets a color.

If an existing property such as category or kind already means the same thing, rename it to type across the folder.

Name important connections

A bare wikilink becomes a gray mentions connection. Give important links a label:

works_at: '[[acme]]'

or in the note:

reports_to:: [[sam-webb]]

When a named connection already joins two cards, md2hd drops the bare mention between them.

What md2hd ignores

Files with no frontmatter block.
Folder nesting as a visual hierarchy. Use relationships to express groups.
Images, PDFs, and canvas files.
Obsidian embeds as embeds. ![[note]] is read as a link to the note.
Plugin behavior that is not stored as markdown or frontmatter.

IDs and filenames

Wikilinks resolve by id, then by a slug of the title or first heading. They do not resolve by filename alone.

A card titled Acme Corp gets the ID acme-corp, so [[Acme Corp]], [[acme corp]], and [[acme-corp]] all find it. Add an explicit id: when a filename and title differ or a title may change.

Work alongside the vault

Importing does not move or change files on your computer. Continue editing in your normal editor and reimport when you want a fresh map.

Edits made in md2hd update its saved copy, not the original vault. Make lasting source changes in your editor.

Hosted Free includes 100 MB of total storage across the workspaces you own, and Hosted Pro includes 1 GB. Import the folder you need rather than an entire large vault. Self-hosted limits are set by its operator.