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This is just a thought I had, not sure if anyone else likes it... I think it would be useful to have the ability for each user (not global) to optionally customize the background color of tags they are interested in on Stack Exchange websites. Currently users can mark preferred tags/ignored tags, but this is a somewhat limited filtering mechanism in that it doesn't allow you to distinguish specific tags amongst the rest.

This is a more of an aesthetics enhancement than anything because obviously users already have the ability to filter by a specific tag. Being able to assign colors to different tags would merely allow users a slightly more custom experience when viewing the lists of questions. Obviously, we already have certain custom formatted tags (primarily on the meta sites) and I'm not suggesting that change; users would merely have that same option extended to them for all tags.

The only drawback I see to this is the possible implications it would have on caching. That being said, if the tag recoloring was performed client-side after the page loaded that would likely reduce the server overhead considerably.

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    You can do this already; it's called user scripting.
    – Welbog
    Feb 10, 2011 at 18:16
  • That is certainly an option, but it's not especially portable.
    – Nathan Taylor
    Feb 10, 2011 at 21:02
  • @ALL CAPS: AGREE 100%
    – GEOCHET
    Feb 15, 2011 at 19:52
  • @Welbo'clock - Completely disagree that user scripting is the answer. An option to provide custom tag color highlight would be a great addition. Say for example I'm interested in Android and C# questions. I could give Android one color and C# another; when scanning the page, it'd be much easier to distinguish them.
    – Metro Smurf
    Jan 31, 2012 at 17:21
  • @Welbog, except not everyone can write user script.
    – DxTx
    Mar 18, 2019 at 11:27

3 Answers 3

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I was planning on requesting the same feature. (so +1 for me!)

It is certainly possible to use scripts to custom color your tags and highlight appropriate questions in the big list.

But, many users do not know how to script (especially non-SO users). So unless one builds a really extended script which allow non-programmers to setup their preferred colors, scripting is not an option for this group of users.

Also, such a script needs to be 'installed' on all computers and other platforms a user uses to browse SO, which is a hassle (or even not possible if the platform does not support user scripts added later, for example mobile phones). And when such an script is written nicely and has the possibility of setting and storing user preferences, it gets even more complicated to get the same experience on all SO browsing points.

For people who are able to build scripts, it still takes quite some time (for me at least), which is not worth it. I suppose (almost) all users able to script think the same (unless there are indeed people who build scripts for this, please send it over to me ;) ). But, I there is one person able to implement it for everyone at once (ie a site developer) it might be worth the time to make lots of users happy (assuming there will be lots of users happy even though this feature request only has 5 up votes yet).

Furthermore, it is already possible to highlight favorite tags and ignored tags, so having multiple colors on tags is already possible. Would it too much (more) work to extend this and add custom colors for tags?

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  • I was just looking at adding the same feature request on Meta. Very well written and said. Agree 100%.
    – Metro Smurf
    Jan 31, 2012 at 17:22
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I agree with @ALLCAPS's comment: a personal Greasemonkey (or similar) script is the way to go here. Making this a server-side thing seems like a lot of work for the devs for little benefit.

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    You could say that about many SO features. Why even have a favorite tags feature when each user can cobble together their own solution?
    – Caleb
    Jun 29, 2011 at 15:37
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    @Caleb, the same logic applies. It's a cost-benefit analysis. How many people would benefit from a given feature? How much would they benefit? Would anyone be hurt by it? How much dev time/effort would it take? The team thought favorite tags were worth the cost; I think custom colorization wouldn't be.
    – Pops
    Jun 29, 2011 at 16:14
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    I agree about the cost-benefit analysis – I just disagree about the conclusion. All SO (and probably SE) users would benefit in much the same way that they currently benefit from favorite tags and ignored tags. I have no idea how much work it'd be for the developers. I found this Q because I had the same idea, and it turns out that there are several other similar Q's.
    – Caleb
    Jun 29, 2011 at 16:30
  • Completely disagree that a Greasemonkey (or similar) script is the way to go. An option to provide custom tag color highlight would be a great addition. Say for example I'm interested in Android and C# questions. I could give Android one color and C# another; when scanning the page, it'd be much easier to distinguish them.
    – Metro Smurf
    Jan 31, 2012 at 17:19
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I maed a script but i really think that it would be a great (and hardly hard to implement) addition.

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