WorldAnvil-to-MD

Parses a World Anvil world export into Markdown files, primarily for Obsidian. The script also adds some metadata yaml to the files and downloads images which are formatted as Obsidian embeds.

I wanted to bring my World Anvil content over to Obsidian but it was going to take me quite a bit of time to move it all over, much less in an organized fashion. Hence, this nifty bit of code.

If you're reading this, we're probably of a like mind, so I'll shout out two things that have made my GM'ing life far easier:

• If you use FoundryVTT for D&D like I do go check out this awesome plugin by Praxxian that lets you import Obsidian files, images and all, into Foundry: https://github.com/Praxxian/lava-flow
• I also highly recommend Jeremy and all of their great Obsidian plugins for your D&D needs.

Usage

Using the script

The key variables you need to edit are:

source_directory = 'World-Anvil-Export'
destination_directory = 'World-Anvil-Output'
obsidian_resource_folder = 'images'

attempt_bbcode = True

source_directory should point at the local folder with your world anvil exports destination_directory is where you want the formatted files and folders to end up obsidian_resource_folder is where the images will be stored attempt_bbcode determines whether or not it will attempt to convert BBCode to Markdown... it works sometimes, and probably is better than not doing so, but it isn't perfect

Once these variables are set run the script with Python and it will print output when it is done.

Sample file structire

An example file structure to export your files could look like so:

-> WorldAnvil-to-MD/
---> images/
---> World-Anvil-Export/
---> World-Anvil-Output/
---> WA-Parser.py

Modifying

If you have any specialized sections or content tags you need to extract, you can try and add them under content_tags_to_extract. Same with specific yaml metadata you want to add, you can try and add an additional entry under yaml_data. The format is looking for nested tags, so keep that in mind depending on how nested your tags are.

Exporting directly into your vault

It is recommended that you export to a separate folder rather than directly into your Obsidian vault, then when done simply drag the output into the vault.

However if you would like to import directly into your vault, change the destination_directory to the desired location in your vault and the obsidian_resource_folder path to your Obsidian attachments folder. I recommend backing up your vault before doing it with this method, as things may be overwritten if filenames match. But if you're brave, go for it.

Exporting from World Anvil

See World Anvil's instructions on this here: https://blog.worldanvil.com/worldanvil/dev-news/new-feature-world-exporting/

A quick rundown on how it's done:

1. In World Anvil go to your world configuration page and select "Open Tools & Advanced Actions"
2. Select the dropdown for "EXPORT WORLD" click "Export this World"
3. You're going to need an API key for this. You can make one here: https://www.worldanvil.com/api/auth/key
4. To finalize the export you need to provide your API key and an email address, specifically a Google one according to World Anvil (This looks to because they are sharing a drive version of the export with you, rather than emailing it directly to you)
5. You can leave "Include Worlds" blank to export everthing, or specify a world name, then click Start
6. Once it is completed you will be emailed your world export