---
name: bear-notes
description: Create, search, and manage Bear notes via grizzly CLI.
homepage: https://bear.app
metadata:
  {
    "gensparx":
      {
        "emoji": "🐻",
        "os": ["darwin"],
        "requires": { "bins": ["grizzly"] },
        "install":
          [
            {
              "id": "go",
              "kind": "go",
              "module": "github.com/tylerwince/grizzly/cmd/grizzly@latest",
              "bins": ["grizzly"],
              "label": "Install grizzly (go)",
            },
          ],
      },
  }
---

# Bear Notes

Use `grizzly` to create, read, and manage notes in Bear on macOS.

Requirements

- Bear app installed and running
- For some operations (add-text, tags, open-note --selected), a Bear app token (stored in `~/.config/grizzly/token`)

## Getting a Bear Token

For operations that require a token (add-text, tags, open-note --selected), you need an authentication token:

1. Open Bear → Help → API Token → Copy Token
2. Save it: `echo "YOUR_TOKEN" > ~/.config/grizzly/token`

## Common Commands

Create a note

```bash
echo "Note content here" | grizzly create --title "My Note" --tag work
grizzly create --title "Quick Note" --tag inbox < /dev/null
```

Open/read a note by ID

```bash
grizzly open-note --id "NOTE_ID" --enable-callback --json
```

Append text to a note

```bash
echo "Additional content" | grizzly add-text --id "NOTE_ID" --mode append --token-file ~/.config/grizzly/token
```

List all tags

```bash
grizzly tags --enable-callback --json --token-file ~/.config/grizzly/token
```

Search notes (via open-tag)

```bash
grizzly open-tag --name "work" --enable-callback --json
```

## Options

Common flags:

- `--dry-run` — Preview the URL without executing
- `--print-url` — Show the x-callback-url
- `--enable-callback` — Wait for Bear's response (needed for reading data)
- `--json` — Output as JSON (when using callbacks)
- `--token-file PATH` — Path to Bear API token file

## Configuration

Grizzly reads config from (in priority order):

1. CLI flags
2. Environment variables (`GRIZZLY_TOKEN_FILE`, `GRIZZLY_CALLBACK_URL`, `GRIZZLY_TIMEOUT`)
3. `.grizzly.toml` in current directory
4. `~/.config/grizzly/config.toml`

Example `~/.config/grizzly/config.toml`:

```toml
token_file = "~/.config/grizzly/token"
callback_url = "http://127.0.0.1:42123/success"
timeout = "5s"
```

## Notes

- Bear must be running for commands to work
- Note IDs are Bear's internal identifiers (visible in note info or via callbacks)
- Use `--enable-callback` when you need to read data back from Bear
- Some operations require a valid token (add-text, tags, open-note --selected)
