So came across this forever notes idea, and while I’m not sure about that particular setup, it did occur that I should be using tagging a bit more. Gave something similar a go and had a couple of feature requests for tagging in Bear:
Autocomplete tags in search: when typing in search it would be great if it would offer a list of tags for autocompletion after you start typing # .
Select multiple tags in the sidebar: it would be great to be able to select multiple tags in then sidebar to search for multiple tags. Even better would be the ability to exclude tags by, for example, control clicking on a tag. Apple Notes’s tag cloud has the former, although like with tagging in Notes in general, it’s a bit half baked.
Smart folders / Tags; Stealing another idea from Apple Notes, having a Smart Folder / tag would be really useful for displaying multiple tags at one, or filtering by other criteria. The apple notes one is surprisingly fully featured:
Subtler Inline Tags: This is more of a preference thing, but would be great to have tags appear as text; I find the pill shape pretty distracting and heavy on the page. Would be great to have the option to render it as a link (or a theme that does so).
Anyways, that was the main thing that cropped up for me; curious to know what others think, or have I missed something (or am just using tagging wrong).
Autocomplete tags in search: You are not the first one to ask for that and for sure that is a highly desired feature that offers much convenience. I would like to add that I would like to see progressive filtering inside the autocomplete list, means: only those tags are listed that appear in the notes list so that you would never end with an empty notes list. To take it one step further: The autocomplete list for a second tag in the search field should also only show those tags that appear in the already filtered list. And so on. I fear however that bears database is not capable to do that.
Select multiple tags in sidebar: Not what I really need or ever have thought of. But that’s a feature that wouldn’t disturb me. However, as bears handling of tags is totally different to apple notes single tags I think it would go to far to exclude tags.
Smart folders: Saving queries from the search field is definitely a desirable feature. But I wouldn’t like to see them in the left sidebar which is so unique, clean and minimal that it is the identification mark of bear. I think the second pane should be the best place where to store the search queries.
Subtler inline tags: The current appearance I consider as perfect. A rendering as link would cause mass confusion
I second every suggestion made by the OP, and have two additional requests.
First, besides the exclude modification click (to exclude notes with a certain tag) I’d love another mode an OR filter (so clicking adds the clicked tag with an AND operator, option clicking with a NOT operator and shift clicking with an OR operator).
I’d also love it if the sidebar would be filtered to only show tags that are applied to the current filtered notes.
Ie clicking in tag A would filter the notes list to show only notes with tag A. The sidebar would then only show the tags that are applied to the filtered notes (ie all tags applied to the notes that are tagged A). Option clicking the B tag would include all notes tagged either with tag A OR B and filter the sidebar tag list to only show the tags that are applied to the remaining notes (Ie notes tagged A OR B). Shot clicking tag C would update the notes list to show only notes tagged A OR B but not C and update the sidebar tag list accordingly.
You don’t seem to have thought all this through properly. I wonder how the whole thing should be implemented in terms of usability. You can’t want to filter the sidebar on the one hand and to use an OR-operator on the other hand because nothing would be left that would make sense to select. And what should a click with a NOT-operator do other than confusingly make the tag that was selected disappear? How to visualize which operator is applied on which tag?
I highly advocate to let the sidebar untouched. I understand the need to create a list of notes according to strictly defined criteria based on the tags. But I would prefer something like a wizard (see the screenshot in the first post). What you suggest would end in a usability nightmare.
