Building a text editor is hard work, but it’s worth it.

Bear 2 is a major update to the popular note-taking app Bear, which was an immediate hit when it launched in 2016. The new version has taken a long time to build, over 5 years, as the developers decided to completely rewrite the underlying text editor to enable features like tables, GIFs, and footnotes. The developer says building a great text editing system proved more difficult than expected due to edge cases and complications. While Bear 2 has many new features, the developer wants to stay focused on the needs of average users rather than power users, and is skeptical of AI assistants in note-taking apps for now. Based on my experience with the beta, Bear 2 still captures what made the original great - it’s simple and fast like Apple Notes but with more powerful features.

      • Artemis@beehaw.orgEnglish
        4·
        1 year ago

        Signed up for it a few years back and really wanted to use it full time, but my work won’t allow me to use a MacBook so I’d have to separate work notes and personal notes which is too much of a hassle for me.

  • Leigh@beehaw.orgMEnglish
    8·
    1 year ago

    I really love Bear, and I’m immensely relieved they’re not trying to bake AI garbage into it.

  • lckdscl [they/them]@whiskers.bim.boatsEnglish
    7·
    1 year ago

    Typical Verge headline…“A terrific notes app [for the Apple ecosystem]”. FTFY.

    Also, I wouldn’t call it simple. A simple notes “app” is a plain text or markdown editor.

  • thatonedude1210@beehaw.orgEnglish
    6·
    1 year ago

    Bear was phenomenal when I had an all Apple ecosystem. I don’t anymore, so I’m trying to replicate it with notion. Works out pretty well.

  • kuchai@beehaw.orgEnglish
    6·
    1 year ago

    I love Bear and used to use it a lot, but don’t want to be locked into just apple stuff. Still I am glad to see they’re still going strong and I’m really happy they aren’t forcing AI integration (which is something Notion has done/is currently doing and monetizing…).

  • albsen@beehaw.orgEnglish
    5·
    1 year ago

    Looks nice, but I moved to Joplin from my ancient evernote account recently. Joplin (fully #FOSS) and syncs via nextcloud, Dropbox or others and is fully end to end encrypted.

  • Jagget@programming.devEnglish
    2·
    1 year ago

    Though it’s without web app, but I owe all my notes in Obsidian + Logseq. Sync over iCloud on all 3 my devices (Windows, MacBook, iPhone)

    • trashhalo@beehaw.orgOPEnglish
      2·
      1 year ago

      logseq is amazing. I love that tool. I made the graph analysis plugin. have you ever tried it?

      • Jagget@programming.devEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        Not yet. I discovered Logseq just about a week ago, so there is no much of a graph to analyze. But I sure will!