Using `nerd-icons` for `citar-symbols` leads to use of default values (`F`, `N`, `L`) instead

[stewmehr]

Describe the bug When trying to include nerd-icons (I have used all-the-icons before with no issues), the entries in citar-symbols fall back to the default values of F, N, L.

To Reproduce Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Install nerd-icons, e.g. via

   (use-package nerd-icons
   :straight (nerd-icons
              :type git
              :host github
              :repo "rainstormstudio/nerd-icons.el"))

2. Modify config to use citar-symbols

   (use-package citar
   ;; ...
   ;; other config
   ;; ...
   :custom
   (citar-symbols
    `((file ,(nerd-icons-faicon "nf-fa-file_pdf_o" :face 'nerd-icons-lred :v-adjust -0.1) . " ")
      (note ,(nerd-icons-sucicon "nf-custom-orgmode" :face 'nerd-icons-lgreen :v-adjust -0.1) . " ")
      (link ,(nerd-icons-octicon "nf-oct-link" :face 'nerd-icons-lblue :v-adjust 0.01) . " "))))

3. Open up citar notes via M-x citar-open-notes
4. The pop-buffer that opens up contains letters F, N, and L instead of their replacements defined above.

Expected behavior I would expect the letters to be replaced by their respective glyphs.

Screenshots

Emacs version: 28.2

Additional context I am well aware that this issue does very little to improve the functionality of this great package and only covers aesthetics. When browsing the list of old issues, I had really hoped for this to be a duplicate of #667. But: I was surprised to see that the default values are displayed instead of empty spaces or broken glyphs. This seemed weirder to me than a simple missing font/wrong scaling on my end so I would like to learn more about this.

Below, I attach the value of describe-variable citar-symbols - in my Emacs, the three glyphs in question are displayed perfectly fine in the *Help* buffer (not sure if this works when pasting them here, so please ~take my word for it~ see additional screenshot below):

citar-symbols is a variable defined in ‘citar.el’.

Its value is shown below.

Configuration alist specifying which symbol or icon to pick for a bib entry.
This leaves room for configurations where the absense of an item
may be indicated with the same icon but a different face.

To avoid alignment issues make sure that both the car and cdr of a symbol have
the same width.

  You can customize this variable.

Value:
((file
  #("" 0 1
    (face #1=(:family #2="Symbols Nerd Font Mono" :height 1.0 :inherit nerd-icons-lred)
      font-lock-face #1# display
      (raise -0.1)
      rear-nonsticky t))
  . " ")
 (note
  #("" 0 1
    (face #3=(:family #2# :height 1.0 :inherit nerd-icons-lgreen)
      font-lock-face #3# display
      (raise -0.1)
      rear-nonsticky t))
  . " ")
 (link
  #("" 0 1
    (face #4=(:family #2# :height 1.0 :inherit nerd-icons-lblue)
      font-lock-face #4# display
      (raise 0.01)
      rear-nonsticky t))
  . " "))
Original value was 
((file "F" . " ")
 (note "N" . " ")
 (link "L" . " "))

[bdarcus]

I think the merger of "indicators" obsoleted that defcustom, and I just haven't removed it.

Can you take that a look at that section of the README and report back?

[stewmehr]

Of course that fixes it! Got rid of that part in my :custom block and defined some citar-indicator-* vars in my :config block instead.

Should re-read the docs whenever I absent-mindedly update a package, I just didn't connect the dots this time and thought it was due to switching from all-the-icons to nerd-icons.

Thank you very much! 🙂

EDIT: I'll leave my adjusted config for posteriority

(use-package citar
    ;; ...
    ;; other config
    ;; ...
    :config
    (defvar citar-indicator-files-icon
      (citar-indicator-create
       :symbol (nerd-icons-faicon
                "nf-fa-file_pdf_o"
                :face 'nerd-icons-lred)
       :function #'citar-has-files
       :padding " "
       :tag "has:files"))
    (defvar citar-indicator-notes-icon
      (citar-indicator-create
       :symbol (nerd-icons-sucicon
                "nf-custom-orgmode"
                :face 'nerd-icons-lgreen)
       :function #'citar-has-notes
       :padding " "
       :tag "has:notes"))
    (defvar citar-indicator-links-icon
      (citar-indicator-create
       :symbol (nerd-icons-octicon
                "nf-oct-link"
                :face 'nerd-icons-lblue)
       :function #'citar-has-links
       :padding " "
       :tag "has:links"))
    (defvar citar-indicator-cited-icon
      (citar-indicator-create
       :symbol (nerd-icons-octicon
                "nf-oct-book"
                :face 'nerd-icons-lred)
       :function #'citar-is-cited
       :padding " "
       :tag "is:cited"))
    (setq citar-indicators
          (list citar-indicator-files-icon
                citar-indicator-notes-icon
                citar-indicator-links-icon
                citar-indicator-cited-icon))
    ;; ...
)