Breadcrumbs V4

February 16, 2026 · View on GitHub

V4 is a complete rewrite of the plugin. As a result:

  • Many long-standing issues are now resolved
  • Most features have been reimplimented with backwards-compatiable behaviour.
  • There are also some breaking changes (marked with "⚠️").

Usage

You can start using V4 right now by installing it with the BRAT plugin

Tip

There are still some logs enabled in these early stages. One particularly helpful log happens everytime you rebuild the graph, and are prefixed with explicit_edge_results. These logs tell you any warnings/errors that occured when rebuilding the graph, and which file had the error.

Changes

Foundational Changes

  • Nodes are added to the graph using their full path, not just their basename. This fixes issue: #136
  • Implied relationships are customizable per-Hierarchy, not just globally. This resolves: #338

Features

Legend:

  • ✅: Already implemented. Working as previously, and possibly better.
  • ⌚: Working on, still intend to implement.
  • ❌: Removed, don't plan to implement.
  • ❔: Undecided for now.

Graph Builders

Previously referred to as "Alternative Hierarchies", these are the various ways to add edges to the Breadcrumbs graph.

  • ✅ Regular frontmatter links (up: [[note]] in YAML)
  • ✅ Dataview links (up:: [[note]])
  • ✅ Tag notes
  • ✅ List notes (previously called "Hierarchy notes")
  • ✅ Dendron notes
  • ✅ Date notes
  • ✅ Folder notes
  • ✅ Regex notes
  • ❔ CSV notes
  • ❔ Traverse notes
  • ❌ Link Notes
    • Can achieve the same effect with BC-dataview-note-query: outgoing([[]])
    • Relevant docs

Commands

  • ✅ Create index from note (and copy to clipboard)
  • ✅ Write Breadcrumbs to file (now called "Freeze implied edges")
  • ✅ Jump to first neighbour (in a given direction or field)
  • ✅ Thread a new note from the current note

Views

  • ✅ Matrix view
  • ✅ Previous/Next view
  • ✅ Grid view
  • ✅ Path view (previously called "Trail view". Grid view and Path view are now just ways to show the "Trail view")
  • ✅ Tree view
  • ❌ Juggl view No longer supported
  • ❌ Ducks view
  • ❌ Visualisations View (far too complicated, never quite worked)

Codeblocks

  • ✅ Tree
  • ❌ Juggl

API

  • ✅

Breaking Changes ⚠️

  • The BC-tag-note field is now called BC-tag-note-tag.
    • You will be notified if any notes use the old syntax, so you can change them.
  • The setting for specifying which notes to treat as List notes (previously "Hierarchy notes") now uses a frontmatter field instead. So whereas previously you listed all List note names in one setting, you now have to use the BC-list-note-field in each of your list notes.
    • You will be notified if any notes use the old syntax, so you can change them.
  • The Refresh Breadcrumbs Index command is renamed to Rebuild graph. You will therefore need to rebind any hotkeys.
  • The codeblock from field is now called dataview-from.
    • You will be notified if any codeblocks use the old syntax, so you can change them.
  • The BC-Link class is now called BC-edge.
  • The BC-Implied class is now called BC-edge-implied.