ESV API integration

Disciples Journal sources passage text from the ESV API. This doc covers how requests are made, how content is stored, and the caching model. Primary code: src/services/ESVApiService.ts and src/services/BibleContentService.ts.

Authentication

The user supplies an ESV API token in plugin settings (Settings → Disciples Journal → ESV API). It is stored in settings.esvApiToken.
Requests send Authorization: Token <esvApiToken>.
With no token set, onload shows a notice, and any download attempt returns a BibleApiResponse error of type ApiAuthentication.

When the API is called

Content resolution runs through BibleContentService.getBibleContent(ref), which only reaches the network as a last resort:

In-memory passageCache (keyed by BibleReference).
A local note on disk — its frontmatter is parsed back into a response via ESVApiService.toBibleApiResponse.
The ESV API — only if settings.downloadOnDemand is enabled. Otherwise it returns a RequestsForbidden error and logs.

The request

downloadFromESVApi(ref) calls Obsidian's requestUrl (not fetch, per the obsidian-plugin-development guidelines) against:

https://api.esv.org/v3/passage/html/?q=<ref>
  &include-passage-references=false
  &include-verse-numbers=true
  &include-first-verse-numbers=true
  &include-footnotes=true
  &include-headings=true

The HTML format is requested so the renderer can preserve ESV typesetting (poetry, headings, footnotes, Words of Christ).

Footnotes are always fetched, then hidden at render time

include-footnotes=true is hardcoded, so footnotes are always baked into the stored HTML — hiding them is a render-time concern, not an API one (and changing the toggle doesn't require re-downloading). Two independent settings control it:

hideFootnotes — rendered full passages; applied as CSS by BibleStyles.
hideFootnotesInPreview — hover preview; BibleReferenceRenderer.showVersePreview removes .footnotes / .extra_text / .footnote nodes from the cloned HTML.

Both default to false. To change footnote behavior, look here — not at the request.

Single-chapter-book workaround

The ESV API returns only the first verse when you request a whole single-chapter book (e.g. Obadiah 1). As a workaround, for chapter references to books with a single chapter the request is widened to verses 1-999. See downloadFromESVApi and BookNames.getChapterCount.

Storage: notes as cache

A successful download is persisted by saveESVApiResponseAsMdNote:

Location — <bibleContentVaultPath>/<preferredBibleVersion>/<Book>/ with filenames from BibleFiles.pathForPassage (Book N.md for chapters, Book NvV[-E].md for verse ranges). Missing folders are created.
Body — a bible code block containing the canonical reference.
Frontmatter — the raw API response is written field-by-field (query, canonical, parsed, passage_meta, passages) via app.fileManager.processFrontMatter, plus any user-configured custom frontmatter (FrontmatterUtil).

Because the frontmatter is the cache, reopening a chapter reads the note and runs toBibleApiResponse on the stored JSON instead of re-hitting the API. The Update frontmatter on all Bible notes command re-applies custom frontmatter across existing notes.

Errors

All failures funnel through BibleApiResponse.error(message, ErrorType) (ApiAuthentication, BadApiResponse, RequestsForbidden, …). User-visible cases surface an Obsidian Notice; internal ones are logged to the console.

Attribution when reproducing verse text

The verse-selection blockquote format (VerseFormatter.formatBlockquote) reproduces ESV text into the user's note and appends a — <ref> (ESV) citation. The ESV API copyright/permissions terms require attribution when ESV text is quoted; the (ESV) suffix is the minimum, and larger reproductions carry a fuller copyright-notice obligation. If the quoting story expands (e.g. exporting many passages), revisit the notice requirement here. The other two formats (inline reference, bible block) store only a reference, not text, so they don't trigger this.

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