Atmosphere & Polish Toggles
Four polish toggles that gate the Celestial Vault’s atmospheric layer — empty-tab effects, animations, status bar, note lock.
The Celestial Vault's visual / experiential layer is rich — and not everyone wants every piece of it on at the same time. The Polish & atmosphere section of settings has four master toggles for the most intrusive parts of the experience.
Where The Toggles Live
Settings → Celestial Vault → Polish & atmosphere
Four switches:
- Empty-state atmosphere
- Animations (master switch)
- Dynamic shortcut status bar
- Note Lock
Each one applies live — no reload needed.
1. Empty-State Atmosphere
What it controls: the stars + greeting + looping background on empty tabs.
On (default): empty tabs show the constellation, the gradient greeting, the rising particles, the looping bg.webm.
Off: empty tabs go plain. Your nickname / greeting still appear (briefly), but no atmosphere wrapping them. Performance: slightly lighter on GPU during empty-tab time, though the cost is already minimal.
When to turn off.
- Older or low-power machine where every CPU/GPU cycle counts
- Screen sharing where you want a clean, minimal interface
- You just genuinely prefer empty empty
Otherwise leave it on. It's part of why the vault feels finished.
2. Animations (Master Switch)
What it controls: all four veil animations (Creation, Deletion, Navigation, Graph) plus the journal widget burst.
On (default): every transition plays its full animation. Note creation feels ceremonial. Navigation feels weighty. Streak increments celebrate.
Off: every transition is instant. No veils. No widget burst. The vault still works exactly the same — just without animation polish.
When to turn off.
- Battery-conscious — the cost is real but small
- Distracting in some workflows (e.g., creating 10 notes in rapid succession when you don't want a flourish each time)
- You prefer minimalism aesthetically
Some users keep animations on for daily writing and turn them off during template-editing or batch-creation sessions, then turn them back on.
3. Dynamic Shortcut Status Bar
What it controls: the context-aware shortcut bar at the bottom of the window.
On (default): the bottom of the window shows clickable hint chips that change based on what kind of note you're in.
Off: no shortcut bar visible. The shortcuts themselves still work — they're still bound — you just can't click hint chips to fire them.
When to turn off.
- You've fully memorized the shortcuts and the bar feels redundant
- You want maximum vertical writing space
- You're recording a screen tutorial and want a cleaner UI
Toggling back on instantly restores the bar.
4. Note Lock
What it controls: the password gate on *Locked* notes.
On (default): notes with *Locked* in their categories show a password prompt instead of their content.
Off: locked notes become readable without a password.
When to turn off temporarily.
- You've forgotten your password and need to access a locked note (you can disable the lock to read it, then re-enable)
- You're demoing the vault to someone and don't want a password gate showing up unexpectedly
Re-enabling restores the password requirement (and your existing password — you don't have to re-set).
What's Not In Here
The Polish & atmosphere section covers the major experiential toggles. A few related but separate settings live elsewhere:
| Setting | Where to find it |
|---|---|
| The Celestial theme color palette | Appearance → Themes |
| Individual CSS snippets | Appearance → CSS snippets |
| Style Settings (atmospheric tweaks) | Style Settings plugin tab |
| Banner system positioning | Per-note frontmatter — see Custom Banners |
| Font choices | Appearance → Font |
Combining Toggles For Different Modes
A few setups that work well:
"Clean Writing Mode"
- Empty-state atmosphere: off
- Animations: off
- Dynamic shortcut status bar: off
- Note Lock: on
A near-vanilla Obsidian feel with the categorical structure intact. Useful for long writing sessions where the polish becomes friction.
"Default Mode"
- All four: on
The shipping default. Best for typical journaling and reflection days.
"Demo Mode"
- All atmospheric toggles: on
- Note Lock: off
Maximum visual impact, no surprise password prompts. Good for screen recordings, demos to friends, or when you want the vault to show off.
"Battery Mode"
- Empty-state atmosphere: off
- Animations: off
- Dynamic shortcut status bar: on (small cost)
- Note Lock: on
Lightweight when traveling.
A Note On Persistence
Toggle states are stored in .obsidian/plugins/celestial-plugin/data.json. They sync between devices if your .obsidian/ folder syncs. They survive Celestial updates.
If you ever want to reset all polish toggles to defaults: open the data.json file and look for these keys:
"emptyStateAtmosphere": true,
"animationsEnabled": true,
"shortcutStatusBar": true,
"noteLockEnabled": true,Set them all to true (or whatever you want), save, reload Obsidian.
Up Next
- The Empty-Tab Atmosphere — what the empty-state toggle controls
- The Four Veils — what the animations toggle gates
- The Shortcut Bar — what the shortcut bar toggle controls
- Note Lock — what the lock toggle gates