hermes 681d926797 Finalize vault: fix Bases syntax, add Quartz fields, improve template

Changes from Codex review:
- Bases: rename .md -> .base, fix filter to file.name == 'index.md',
  fix formula to now() (not date(now)), add proper views section with
  table view and column order, add displayName for properties
- Frontmatter: add 'description' (SEO/link previews) and 'draft' (publishing
  control) fields for Quartz compatibility
- Template: add '## Scope' section, add '## Related Research' section for
  explicit wikilinks between topics, use path-qualified wikilinks in detail
  files section to avoid ambiguous basenames across topics
- README: fix cross-vault wikilink claim (separate vaults can't resolve
  cross-vault links; Quartz can't publish outside its content tree),
  document draft field, clarify that tags don't create graph edges

2026-07-29 11:28:38 +00:00

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Research Vault

A vault for structured research — investigation, analysis, and synthesis across topics.

Workflow

Discuss research questions in Buzz channels — #research, #general, wherever the question arises.
Declare — when a research thread is worth keeping, @hermes-agent logs it here as a new topic directory.
Investigate — the agent populates index.md with findings and creates detail files as the research grows.
Synthesize — when research concludes, the index.md summary is finalized and status moves to concluded.

Structure

Each research topic is a directory at the vault root with an index.md entry point:

<topic-slug>/
  index.md              ← frontmatter + summary + key findings (the entry point)
  sources.md            ← links, references, data sources
  analysis.md           ← deep analysis, findings
  methodology.md        ← how the research was conducted
  notes.md              ← working notes, raw observations
  summary.md            ← final synthesis (when concluded)
  next-steps.md         ← follow-up questions, gaps

Small topics: just index.md alone in the directory.
Big topics: split into detail files as they grow. Link them from index.md with path-qualified wikilinks (e.g. [[topic-slug/sources|Sources]]) to avoid ambiguous basenames across topics.
Detail file names are up to you — sources, analysis, methodology, notes, summary, next-steps are common patterns.

Frontmatter (in `index.md`)

---
title: One-line summary
description: Short description for search results and link previews
status: exploring | active | concluded | shelved
category: market | technical | competitive | legal | scientific | exploratory
tags: []
draft: true
created: YYYY-MM-DD
updated: YYYY-MM-DD
origin: buzz://<channel-uuid>/<event-id>
---

description — improves search results, link previews, RSS, and SEO when published via Quartz.
draft: true — excludes the topic from the published site. Set draft: false when ready to publish.
created / updated — Quartz recognizes these for date display and sorting.

Category	Kind of research
`market`	Market analysis, sizing, trends
`technical`	Technology evaluation, architecture research, tool comparison
`competitive`	Competitor analysis, landscape mapping
`legal`	Regulatory, compliance, legal landscape
`scientific`	Literature review, paper analysis
`exploratory`	Open-ended investigation, "what is X"

Status Lifecycle

exploring → active → concluded
                 ↘ shelved

exploring — just started, gathering sources, scoping the question
active — ongoing research, regularly updated
concluded — findings synthesized, research complete
shelved — parked, may revisit

Bases

Open Research Base (in bases/research-base.base) to see all topics as a filterable, sortable table — by status, category, tags, or date. Only index.md files appear; detail files are excluded via the file.name == "index.md" filter.

Graph View

Wikilinks between detail files within a topic, and between topics, create a knowledge graph visible in Obsidian's graph view. Use path-qualified links ([[topic-slug/sources|Sources]]) to avoid ambiguous basenames. Tags make topics discoverable and filterable but do not themselves create graph edges — only links do.

Note: cross-vault wikilinks (e.g. to idea-dump entries) only work if both vaults are directories within the same Obsidian vault. If publishing via Quartz, links can only resolve within the same content tree — use public URLs for cross-site references.

Publishing (Future)

The vault is structured for eventual publication as a public knowledge base:

Quartz (recommended) — free static site generator for Obsidian vaults. Preserves wikilinks, backlinks, graph view, and full-text search. Self-hostable via NixOS.
Obsidian Publish — paid, simplest, but not self-hosted.

The index.md + wikilink structure means the published site will render as a connected knowledge graph, not a flat list of documents. The draft frontmatter field controls which topics are published.

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