I don’t think TagCons have been touched since the early days, but now with Bear 2 out, I think they could use some more!
Are there any plans to support additional tagcons? Perhaps even the opportunity to use custom icon libraries?
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We’ve updated our TagCon library a few times, but we definitely do have plans to add more! Let us know anything in your mind, a genre or a specific tagcon you’d like.
For custom icons, it’s a bit tricky due to the variations of the sizes and compatibility with other UI elements. Most likely we won’t implement custom icons, but we’ll give it some thoughts and see if we could make the TagCons even more flexible!
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I’d like a Personal icon, usually represented by a head. Currently Bear suggests a mirror icon for personal, which I don’t prefer. Similarly, an icon with multiple heads, usually to indicate a group of people.
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If you right click you can change different Tagcons for your tags, I also have a #personal tag and I use the glasses TagCon for that 
I know, that’s what I’m using currently. But on other systems (Notion, Obsidian, etc.) I’m using the “head” icon to represent personal. It’d be nicer to have it consistent.
Maybe some machine learning/ AI related icons, like a brain. Some more programming language icons.
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Very much looking forward to more! What’s there is great, but there’s definitely room for a lot more. I submitted some to your Instagram story asking for suggestions a few months ago.
I wanted to throw out a couple of TagCon themes, and specific ones, I would love to see:
- More shapes (specifically a pentagon)
- Career icons (specifically a soldier)
- More animals (specifically an eagle)
- More office themes (specifically a corporate building/skyscraper - like the city one just without all the other buildings)
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As someone who has argued that Bear’s tags can function like folders, I would love a folder icon, as well as a file cabinet. 
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I’m using Bear for product management, college courses, hobbies, etc.
One way to think about the tagcons needed would be to look at say, software development, and create icons for the different parts of that. For school, look at some learning paths and see where you might need some additional variety.
I’m finding myself in situations where there isn’t enough variety to use them well and I have duplicates.
Another thing that could work would be to let us use the icons within SF Symbols. There are a ton in there and they are consistent.
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I’ve been thinking that sometimes the issue isn’t the absence of tag icons but rather the difficulty in finding them. For example, I was searching for a tree icon to represent planting in the garden, I looked for “tree,” which doesn’t exist. However, the “plant” icon is available and could work just as well.
Even for tags like “file” or “archive,” where nothing specific exists, using the “inbox” icon might serve the purpose. Similarly, when I needed an icon for trekking or hiking, I couldn’t find one. Instead, I settled for a “tent” icon, which, in some contexts, might be a suitable alternative.
Perhaps, until more tag icons are added, it would be beneficial to assign additional aliases to the existing ones to make searches easier.
Unfortunately, SFSymbols cannot be used for the Tagcons, as their current usage license does not align with our requirements:
Your use of Symbols obtained from Apple’s SF Font is limited to creating mock-ups of user interfaces for software products running on Apple’s iOS, iPadOS, macOS and tvOS operating systems.
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Ah damn, that’s too bad.
Just adding my two cents that I’d love to see more TagCons and would even be willing to buy “expansion packs” for TagCons that are interesting to me. A fun addition or social media idea could be a request feature for TagCon development. Thanks!
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The available icons in Shortcuts could serve as a great example set (perhaps not as extensive, but you get the idea). I would love it if these (if available as assets) or a similar set were accessible on Bear. I’ve also noticed that the scale of the Bear tag icons is sometimes inconsistent in size and style. Some corners are rounder, others are square, and some icons extend to the edge of their square, while others have empty space or padding around their edges. Just my 2 cents!
Those are the SFSymbols provided by Apple, and we can’t use those if we want to support tagcons on the web. We are in the process of redesigning our tagcon set and adding new icons.
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Tagcons I would love to see:
Because I have Smarthome notes in my Bear app, I’d love to see the following:
- The Matter logo
- The Zigbee logo
- The Home Assistant logo
For music I’d to see an icon for CDs and one for LPs. There is only one icon now for a round disc that plays music.
A key would also be for software license keys
Perhaps also one for each letter of the alphabet
The geek in me would love to see the Red Hat, Ubuntu, SuSE, Fedora and FreeBSD logo.
And lastly, I collect postage stamps, so an icon of a generic postage stamp would be cool.
I thnk custom logos might still be possible if you specify an exact format: height and width in pixels and specific format (png), and then you could import that.
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I think a little typewriter would be cool, along with a floppy disk! I really like using the emoji’s of outdated tech, like the VHS tape or a cassette.
With the requirements of
- Legible at small size
- multi-use
- currently not represented but in the emoji library so like. Useful for someone
I suggest:
- typewriter
- good for writers, typewriter collection cataloguing, indicating old or edit-locked text
- vhs / tape cassette
- obv tape collectors, but also could indicate different kinds of media in a subtag. e.g. #reviews/movies could be served fine by a filmstrip, but drafts about direct-to-streaming home releases could be under #reviews/movies/DTV and it might be useful or fun to differentiate that visually.
- more kinds of planes, not just a jet. Think Cessna 180, piper Cherokee, or biplane
- Planespotters, but also people who own planes, or to differentiate b/t large air travel trips and small ones, flights of fancy also comes to mind. This one has the least usability but my dad’s a pilot and planes have always been a big part of my life so just having a jet kind of stands out to me.
- floppy disk
- It’s a classic! but also to a person of a certain age it’s just what saving things looks like.
- fountain pen not just ballpoint
- Again, collectors. But I am a person who uses a fountain pen and they have such a cool shape that would look cool as an icon. For notes with more artistic weight than a ballpoint conveys, or for fancy thoughts.
- Fedora
- OK now I’m just listing stuff I like BUT I think an Indiana Jones fedora would fit really well in the Fandom section with the Daleks and Darth Vader and w/e. Someone will find a use for it, hat collectors, indiana jones fans, to mark notes as personal or crucial, about me drafts, idk. Joke writers when the joke they think up is a “Hat on a hat” but they don’t want to throw it away so they file it under #hat/hat?
Anyway. I use the tagcons a lot I think they’re a great idea!!
—Jacob
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Yes, please to a Fedora TagCon 
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some anime themed icons would be awesome