# Obsidian R2 Workflow

Canonical: https://www.dipendrakshah.com.np/blog/obsidian-r2-workflow
Author: Dipendra K. Shah
Collection: blog
Status: reference
Published: 2026-07-17
Updated: 2026-08-20
Tags: blog, obsidian, publishing

> How I synchronize Obsidian across devices using Cloudflare R2.

I keep my Obsidian vault backed by a Cloudflare R2 bucket so the same notes
and attachments show up whether I'm writing on my laptop or picking a thought
back up on my phone. That vault is where most articles start: a rough note in
an inbox folder, a few edits over a couple of days, then a move into one of
the public folders once it's ready to be read by someone other than me.

## How publishing actually works right now

The site has a proper pipeline for turning vault notes into published pages.
[Building a Connected Engineering Blog with Next.js](/blog/building-a-connected-engineering-blog) describes it in full:
a `publish: true` note in a public vault folder, a sync script that copies it
into this repository, converts image embeds, and resolves wikilinks, and a
build that validates everything before it ships.

In practice, a good chunk of what actually goes out the door skips that
script entirely. I just edit the Markdown directly in this repository
instead of round-tripping through the vault. That's especially true for
reference pieces, quick fixes, and this article. I commit under my own name
and personal email rather than whatever git identity happens to be
configured on the machine, then push straight to `main`. Vercel picks up
the push automatically and rebuilds the site. There's no separate deploy
step and no staging environment; `main` is live.

That shortcut doesn't skip the parts that actually matter. Whether a note
arrives through the vault sync script or through a direct edit in this repo,
it still has to pass the same frontmatter validation, the same TypeScript and
ESLint checks, and the same production build before it's live. The vault
pipeline exists for notes that genuinely start their life in Obsidian and
need attachments carried over; direct edits are for everything else, which
lately has been most of it.

## Why both paths stay open

The vault sync keeps my writing portable and backed up regardless of which
device I'm on, and it's still the right path for longer notes with images
that began as real Obsidian drafts. The direct-edit path is faster when the
idea and the finished article happen close together, or when I'm fixing
something small enough that pulling out the vault would be more overhead
than the fix itself. I don't think one will fully replace the other. I just
wanted this note to say honestly which one I'm actually using, instead of
only describing the tidier version of the process.