nextcloud / nextcloud/external

Feature request: Auto-fetch favicons from linked website URLs

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Dominant language
JavaScript
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132
Forks
43
Avg merge
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Merged PRs (30d)
2

Description

Feature Request

Summary

When adding an external site, it would be convenient if the app could automatically fetch the favicon from the linked website, rather than requiring the admin to manually upload or specify an icon URL.

Current Behavior

Admins must either:

  • Manually upload an icon file, or
  • Provide an explicit icon URL (e.g. via a third-party favicon API like https://favicon.im/<domain>)

There is no built-in way to automatically resolve the icon for a given URL.

Desired Behavior

When an external site entry is saved (or on demand via a button), the app should:

  1. Fetch the linked URL (or just its root domain)
  2. Detect the favicon via standard discovery mechanisms:
    • <link rel="icon"> / <link rel="shortcut icon"> tags in the page's <head>
    • /favicon.ico at the domain root as a fallback
  3. Store the resolved icon for that entry
Why This Would Help
  • Reduces manual effort for admins managing many external links
  • Keeps icons up to date when websites change their favicons
  • Improves consistency without relying on third-party favicon proxy services
Possible Implementation Notes
  • Fetching could be done server-side (PHP, triggered on save or via a background job)
  • An explicit "Fetch icon" button in the UI would also satisfy this use case without making it fully automatic
  • Privacy: the fetch should be done server-side so the user's browser does not leak requests to external sites during admin configuration
Related Issues
  • #198 — browser tab favicon does not change to match the configured icon (separate but related UX issue)

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start at the external-site save flow and review how manually uploaded icons and explicit icon URLs are currently stored. Trace the admin UI path if adding an on-demand button is considered, then define done as resolving standard favicon links or the root fallback, storing the result, and preserving server-side fetching and failure behavior.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
javascript, php
Domain
backend, frontend
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Quiet
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
48/100

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