Great write-up! It would be useful if various PKMs would settle on a similar format for recording (nested) tasks, dates and metadata, as it seems to have become the standard way to store kanban boards and similar 'enhanced' views. Currently there exist various strategies ranging from embedding JSON as comments to esoteric (non-markdown) formats, often trailing at the end of each task. This makes the source look cluttered and difficult to edit/navigate.

IMO, metadata (such as date ranges) could instead be stored as empty links leading each task (or by showing a custom placeholder symbol such as '@'), paving the way for a 'linked' data format while resulting in a same-width list for easy lookups and editing:

  - [x] [@](/2025/12/30..31.md (15:30:21)) task 1
  - [ ] [@](/2025/12/29..30.md (16:20:31)) task 2
  - [ ] [@](/2025/12/28..28.md (14:20:31)) same day task
    - [ ] undated nested task

For instance, the above tasks would link to the virtual '30..31.md' and '29..30.md' files which collect all backlinked tasks for the provided daterange (akin to Obisidan/Logseq/etc).

In an ideal world, the task marker could hold a custom symbol and linked metadata itself, but would result in non-standard (GFM) markdown:

  - [@](/2025/12/30..31.md (15:30:21)) task 1
  - [ ](/2025/12/29..30.md (16:20:31)) task 2
    - [ ] undated nested task

It would be up to the editor to render this metadata accordingly.