Dashboard Sync (GitHub to Obsidian)¶

The dashboard sync pulls GitHub issues across your repositories into Obsidian as kanban boards, individual issue notes, and a Dataview dashboard. It runs on the host (not inside the VM) and writes directly to your Obsidian vault.

What It Creates¶

After a sync, your vault will contain:

<vault>/
  Engineering/
    Master Kanban.md          # All issues across all repos, grouped by state
    <owner>-<repo> Kanban.md  # Per-repo board (one per repo with issues)
    Issues/
      <owner>-<repo>/
        <number>-<slug>.md    # Individual issue note with YAML frontmatter
    Dashboard.md              # Dataview-powered summary table

Each issue note includes frontmatter with repo, number, state, labels, assignees, created, and updated fields. The kanban boards use Obsidian's native kanban plugin format.

Prerequisites¶

An Obsidian vault on the host filesystem
The sync script at <vault>/_scripts/gh-obsidian-sync.py (or a custom path)
gh CLI authenticated (the script calls gh issue list and gh api)
Python 3.11+ on the host

Configuration¶

Add a [dashboard] section to your sandbox profile (~/.openclaw/sandbox-profile.toml):

[dashboard]
enabled = true
sync_interval = 1
vault_path = "~/Documents/Vaults/MyVault"
lookback_days = 14
repos = []
script_path = ""

Field	Default	Description
`enabled`	`false`	Enable dashboard sync
`sync_interval`	`1`	Sync every Nth heartbeat tick (reserved for future cadence integration)
`vault_path`	`""`	Path to Obsidian vault on host. Falls back to `mounts.vault` if empty
`lookback_days`	`14`	Only sync issues updated within this many days
`repos`	`[]`	Explicit repo list (`["owner/repo", ...]`). Empty = all repos visible to `gh`
`script_path`	`""`	Path to sync script. Empty = auto-discover at `<vault>/_scripts/gh-obsidian-sync.py`

Vault path fallback

If vault_path is empty, the CLI falls back to mounts.vault from the [mounts] section. Set vault_path explicitly if your host vault is at a different location than the VM mount source (e.g., iCloud path vs local symlink).

Usage¶

CLI Command¶

# Run the sync
bilrost dashboard sync

# Preview without writing files
bilrost dashboard sync --dry-run

The bilrost dashboard command (without sync) still opens the gateway dashboard in your browser, same as before. Use --page to jump to a specific page:

bilrost dashboard              # open gateway dashboard
bilrost dashboard --page green # open Green dashboard
bilrost dashboard sync         # run GitHub-to-Obsidian sync

MCP Tool¶

The sandbox_dashboard_sync MCP tool lets agents trigger the sync programmatically:

{
  "tool": "sandbox_dashboard_sync",
  "arguments": {
    "dry_run": false
  }
}

Returns { "stdout": "...", "stderr": "...", "exit_code": 0 }.

Host-Side Wrapper Script¶

scripts/dashboard-sync.sh is a standalone bash script that reads config from the sandbox profile and runs the sync. It is useful for cron/launchd automation or running outside the CLI:

# Manual run
./scripts/dashboard-sync.sh

# Dry run
./scripts/dashboard-sync.sh --dry-run

Automated Scheduling (launchd)¶

A launchd plist is provided at scripts/com.openclaw.dashboard-sync.plist for periodic sync on macOS. This is a manual host-side step — bootstrap and Ansible do not install host launchd agents.

Installation¶

# Copy the plist to your LaunchAgents directory
cp scripts/com.openclaw.dashboard-sync.plist ~/Library/LaunchAgents/

# Load it (starts immediately and runs every 10 minutes)
launchctl load ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.openclaw.dashboard-sync.plist

Verify it is running¶

launchctl list | grep com.openclaw.dashboard-sync

Check logs¶

cat /tmp/dashboard-sync.log

Uninstall¶

launchctl unload ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.openclaw.dashboard-sync.plist
rm ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.openclaw.dashboard-sync.plist

Full Disk Access required

launchd agents cannot access ~/Documents/ (or ~/Library/Mobile Documents/) without Full Disk Access (FDA). Grant FDA to /bin/bash in System Settings > Privacy & Security > Full Disk Access. Running the script manually from Terminal works without this step because Terminal typically has FDA.

This is the same requirement as the vault-sync and cadence host plists. See Cadence > Host-Side Scheduling for more detail.

Not handled by bootstrap

All host-side launchd plists (vault-sync, cadence, dashboard-sync) are manual installs. Bootstrap provisions the VM via Ansible — it does not modify your macOS LaunchAgents. This is by design: host-side scheduling is a user choice, not a provisioning step.

Troubleshooting¶

"Operation not permitted" in logs¶

The launchd agent is hitting the FDA restriction. Grant Full Disk Access to /bin/bash (see warning above).

"Sync script not found"¶

The sync script is auto-discovered at <vault>/_scripts/gh-obsidian-sync.py. If your script is elsewhere, set script_path explicitly in the [dashboard] section of your profile.

"No vault path configured"¶

Set either dashboard.vault_path or mounts.vault in ~/.openclaw/sandbox-profile.toml.

Sync runs but creates no files¶

Check that gh is authenticated: gh auth status
Check --days window: issues older than lookback_days are skipped
Run with --dry-run to see what would be created without writing