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Welcome to Charted Roots

Research, document, and visualize lineages in Obsidian—whether historical or fictional.

Charted Roots transforms structured genealogical data in your Markdown notes into beautifully laid-out family trees. Whether you're a genealogist tracing real ancestors, a novelist mapping fictional dynasties, or a researcher documenting historical figures—store your research in plain text, generate visual trees on demand, and explore your ancestry through interactive charts and maps.

Table of Contents

Quick Start

  1. Get Started - Installation and basic setup
  2. Control Center - Your central hub for all plugin operations
  3. Data Entry - Creating person notes with family relationships
  4. Import & Export - Bring in existing GEDCOM data

Key Features

Import & Export

Bring in existing family data or share your research with others through guided wizards.

  • Import/Export Hub - Centralized entry point with step-by-step wizards
  • Multi-format support - GEDCOM 5.5.1, Gramps XML/.gpkg, and CSV import
  • Dynamic blocks - Optionally add timeline, relationships, and media blocks during import
  • Privacy protection - Configurable privacy controls for living persons on export

Learn about import/export

Data Entry & Management

Create and structure your family data with flexible note types.

  • Person notes - Document individuals with relationship frontmatter
  • Event notes - 22+ built-in event types (birth, death, marriage, residence, occupation, and more)
  • Place notes - Document locations with coordinates and historical context
  • Source notes - Track citations, repositories, and confidence levels

Learn about data entry

Obsidian Bases Integration

Use Obsidian's table-based interface for efficient bulk data entry and editing.

  • Spreadsheet-like editing - Edit multiple people at once
  • Pre-built templates - Ready-to-use Bases for people, places, events, sources, and organizations
  • Sort and filter - Find specific records quickly
  • Automatic sync - Changes flow back to person notes

Set up Bases integration

Evidence & Sources

Track your research with GPS-aligned fact-level source tracking and proof summaries.

  • Source notes - Document sources with citations, repositories, and confidence levels
  • Fact tracking - Track which specific facts have source citations
  • Proof summaries - Document reasoning for genealogical conclusions
  • Citation generator - Generate citations in Chicago, Evidence Explained, MLA, and Turabian formats

Learn about evidence and sources

Data Quality Tools

Keep your family data clean and consistent with the Cleanup Wizard and batch operations.

  • Cleanup Wizard - Guided 10-step workflow for post-import data cleanup
  • Bidirectional validation - Detect and fix one-way relationship inconsistencies
  • Source migration - Convert indexed sources to modern array format
  • Batch operations - Normalize dates, sex values, place names, and more

Manage your data

Events & Timelines

Document life events and visualize them chronologically with person, family, and place timelines.

  • Event notes - 22+ built-in event types (birth, death, marriage, residence, occupation, and more)
  • Timeline views - Person timelines, family timelines, place timelines, and global timeline
  • Timeline export - Export to Canvas, Excalidraw, or Markdown tables
  • Date precision - Support for exact, estimated, ranges, and partial dates

Learn about events and timelines

Geographic Features

Visualize where your ancestors lived, worked, and traveled with integrated map views.

  • Place notes - Document locations with coordinates and historical context
  • Life event mapping - See birth, death, marriage, and residence locations
  • Route visualization - Track migration patterns and journeys
  • Custom maps - Support for fictional world mapping with custom image maps

Discover geographic features

Interactive Family Chart View

A dedicated view for exploring family relationships with zoom, pan, and click-to-navigate functionality.

  • Smooth navigation - Zoom and pan through large family trees
  • Inline editing - Add, modify, and delete relationships directly in the chart
  • Multiple display modes - Compact, detailed, and photo views
  • Bidirectional sync - Changes automatically update your markdown notes

Explore the chart view

Canvas Tree Generation

Transform person notes with relationship frontmatter into visual family trees on the Obsidian Canvas. Supports multiple layout algorithms, automatic positioning, and unlimited tree depth.

  • Multiple root selection - Generate trees from any ancestor
  • Flexible layouts - Horizontal, vertical, compact, timeline, and hourglass arrangements
  • Smart spacing - Automatic node positioning with collision avoidance
  • Export options - Export trees to Canvas, Excalidraw, or Markdown

Learn about canvas trees

World-Building Suite

Tools for novelists and world-builders working with fictional genealogies.

  • Fictional date systems - Custom calendars and eras (Middle-earth, Westeros, or your own)
  • Organization notes - Noble houses, guilds, corporations, military units
  • Custom relationships - 25+ built-in non-family types across 6 categories, including liege/vassal, ally/rival, mentor/disciple, godparent, witness, neighbor, and more. Also useful for genealogical FAN (Friends, Associates, Neighbors) research.
  • Universe filtering - Separate real and fictional data

Explore world-building features

Customization

Adapt Charted Roots to your existing data structure and terminology.

  • Property aliases - Map your custom frontmatter property names to Charted Roots fields
  • Value aliases - Map custom values (gender, event types, place categories)
  • Type managers - Customize event types, source types, organization types, and more
  • Style Settings - Customize colors via the Style Settings plugin

Configure settings

Documentation

Getting Started

Core Features

Exploration & Visualization

Specialized Features

Reference

Community & Support

Version: 0.17.0 Last Updated: 2025-12-25