Notifications

The notification system runs at the plugin level and periodically scans your vault for tracker data. When alert conditions are met, it sends notifications through your configured channels.

Enable notifications

1. Open Settings > Postpartum Tracker > Notifications.
2. Toggle Enable notifications on.
3. Set the Check interval (how often to scan, in minutes; default: 1).
4. Choose the Notification type: in-app, system, or both.

Alert types

Feeding reminders

Fires when the time since the last completed feeding exceeds the configured threshold (default: 3 hours). No alert fires if a feeding is actively in progress.

Toggle: Feeding reminder enabled

The interval adjusts automatically based on your baby’s age: 2 hours (days 0-7), 2.5 hours (days 8-28), 3 hours (day 29+). You can override this with a custom value in settings.

Medication dose ready

For each enabled medication in your configuration, checks the time since the last dose. Fires within a 5-minute window after the minimum interval elapses.

Toggle: Medication dose ready alerts

Alternating medication schedule

Tracks the Tylenol + Ibuprofen alternating pattern. Fires 3 hours after the most recent pain medication, suggesting you take the other one.

Toggle: Alternating medication alerts

Library tracker reminders

Smart modules from the tracker library (sleep, pumping, bowel movements, mood, temperature) have their own reminder intervals. These fire automatically when enabled.

Module	Default interval
Sleep	3 hours
Pumping	3 hours
Bowel movements	24 hours
Mood check-in	8 hours
Temperature	Configurable

Notification channels

In-app toast

A fixed-position notification appears in the bottom-right corner of the Obsidian window. Each toast includes:

• Title and message
• Dismiss button
• Snooze menu with options: 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours

Snooze state is stored in localStorage and persists across sessions.

System notifications

Uses the Web Notification API to show desktop notifications. The plugin requests permission on first use.

Caution

System notifications do not work on Obsidian mobile. The Capacitor runtime blocks the Web Notification API. Use in-app toasts or webhooks for mobile.

Webhooks (push notifications)

Send push notifications to your phone via external services. Enable multiple services simultaneously — each person sharing a vault can use their preferred service.

Service	Platform	Alarm loop?	DND bypass?	Cost
Pushover	Android + iOS	Yes (retry until ack)	Yes (Critical Alerts)	$4.99 one-time
ntfy.sh	Android + iOS	Android only	Android only	Free
Gotify	Android	No	No	Free (self-hosted)

What works when Obsidian is closed?

Feature	Obsidian open	Obsidian in background	Obsidian closed
In-app toast	Yes	No	No
ntfy push	Yes	Yes	Yes
ntfy scheduled reminder	Yes	Yes	Yes (server-side)
Pushover push	Yes	Yes	Yes
Pushover scheduled reminder	Yes	Maybe*	No (in-process timer)
Todoist reminder	Yes	Yes	Yes (independent)

* Pushover reminders use in-process timers. They fire if Obsidian stays alive in background, but the OS may kill it.

To configure:

1. Enable Webhook notifications.
2. Toggle on the services you want (ntfy, Pushover, Gotify, or Custom).
3. Fill in the required fields (topic name, API keys, etc.).
4. Click Send test to verify connectivity.

ntfy payload format

The plugin sends JSON to the ntfy server root URL (e.g., https://ntfy.sh) with the topic in the body:

{
  "topic": "my-baby-alerts-abc123",
  "title": "Feeding reminder",
  "message": "Last feeding was 3.5 hours ago",
  "priority": 5,
  "tags": ["baby_bottle"]
}

ntfy URL format

The plugin POSTs to the server root (https://ntfy.sh), not to the topic URL (https://ntfy.sh/topic). This is required for ntfy’s JSON publishing API. Posting JSON to a topic URL causes ntfy to display raw JSON text instead of a formatted notification.

Alert level	ntfy priority	Behavior
Info	2 (low)	Silent notification
Warning	3 (default)	Normal sound
Urgent	5 (max)	Overrides DND (Android)

Gotify payload format

{
  "title": "Feeding reminder",
  "message": "Last feeding was 3.5 hours ago",
  "priority": 5
}

The plugin auto-appends /message to your Gotify server URL if not already present.

Alert level	Gotify priority
Info	2
Warning	5
Urgent	8

Pushover payload format

Pushover uses URL-encoded form data with your app token and user key:

Alert level	Pushover priority	Behavior
Info	0 (normal)	Standard notification
Warning	1 (high)	Bypasses quiet hours
Urgent	2 (emergency)	Retries every 60s until acknowledged

Scheduled reminders

When you log a feeding or medication dose, the plugin can immediately schedule a future push notification at the expected next reminder time:

• ntfy: Uses server-side scheduled delivery (In: header) — works even after closing Obsidian.
• Pushover: Uses in-process timeout — only works while Obsidian is open. Pair with Todoist for offline reliability.

Toggle: Schedule reminders on log (enabled by default for ntfy).

Tip

For the best overnight alarm experience, see the Alarm setup guide. iOS users should use Pushover for alarm-loop notifications. Android users can use either ntfy (free) or Pushover.

Suppressing notifications

When Todoist integration is active and creating tasks for alerts, you may want to suppress in-app toasts to avoid duplicate reminders. Enable Suppress toasts when Todoist handles reminders in the Todoist settings section.

How scanning works

The notification check loop:

1. Runs on the configured interval (default: every minute).
2. Scans all markdown files in the vault for postpartum-tracker code blocks.
3. Aggregates tracker data across all code blocks.
4. Evaluates each alert condition against the aggregated data.
5. Fires new notifications and clears resolved ones.
6. Triggers Todoist sync if enabled.

This means alerts work even if you have multiple tracker code blocks across different notes — all data is considered.