obsidian-distill

Use the obsidian-second-brain skill. Execute /obsidian-distill $ARGUMENTS:

The optional argument is a note path, a [[wikilink]], a folder, or a source URL/file. If none is given, ask what to distill (offer the longest recently-touched notes in raw/ and the research folders as candidates).

A distillation is not a summary. A summary throws the source away; a distillation keeps a verifiable trail, so a teammate (or a future agent) can check every claim against the exact place it came from. This is the trust primitive: condensed but never unmoored from evidence.

1. Read _CLAUDE.md first if it exists in the vault root. Resolve the destination folder per references/folder-map.md (a distillation is a concept/reference note: wiki-style wiki/concepts/, Obsidian-style Knowledge/).

2. Resolve and read the source:

   • A vault note or [[wikilink]]: read it in full.
   • A folder: read every note in it and distill them as one corpus (note which file each claim comes from).
   • A URL: fetch it (read the page). A local file: read it. Save the untouched original to raw/ first if it is not already there - the distillation must point at a stable source.
   • Never distill from memory or a partial read. If the source is too large to read in one pass, read it in ordered chunks and keep going; do not sample (see the anti-fabrication rule).

3. Segment the source into stable, citable source blocks and number them. A block is a heading section, a paragraph, a list, or a transcript turn - whatever the source's natural unit is. Record for each block a locator the reader can find again: a heading path, a paragraph index, or a timestamp/line range. These locators are the provenance anchors.

4. Extract the key claims. For each claim, write one tight sentence and attach its provenance: which block(s) it came from, as (src: B3) or (src: B3, B7). Every claim MUST carry at least one block reference - a claim with no source does not go in the distillation (if you believe it but the source does not say it, it is your inference, not a distilled claim; see step 6). Mark each claim's confidence (stated | high | medium | speculation) and add a recency marker on any time-sensitive external fact ((as of YYYY-MM, domain)).

5. Group the claims under short thematic headings (the distilled structure), preserving the provenance tags inline. Keep the source's own terms; do not smooth them into generic phrasing.

6. Keep inference separate from evidence. If the distillation surfaces a conclusion the source implies but never states, put it under a clearly labelled ## Inferences (not in the source) section, each marked confidence: speculation, so distilled fact and your reasoning never blur.

7. Write the distillation note. Path: <resolved-folder>/Distill - <source-title> (YYYY-MM-DD).md. It MUST follow references/ai-first-rules.md. If that path does not resolve from your working directory, search upward for it; if you still cannot read it, say so before writing rather than producing a note that silently skips the rule. Frontmatter includes type: distillation, ai-first: true, source (the verbatim path/URL of what was distilled), source-blocks (the count), date, tags: [distillation, thinking], related-people and related-projects (wikilinks, per the type: distillation schema). Body order:

   • ## For future agent - 2-3 sentences: what was distilled, why, and that every claim carries a (src: Bn) pointer back to the numbered source blocks at the bottom for verification.
   • ## Distilled claims - the grouped claims with inline provenance tags.
   • ## Inferences (not in the source) - only if step 6 produced any.
   • ## Source blocks - the numbered list (B1, B2, ...) with each block's locator (heading/paragraph/timestamp) and a short quote or first line, so the anchors are resolvable from inside the vault. This is the recency/verification anchor.

8. Link the distillation from the original source note (add a Distilled: [[...]] line) and from today's daily note. Append a one-line entry to the operation log (Logs/YYYY-MM-DD.md if it exists, else log.md).