Accidental deletion should be easier to prevent

[morags]

Is your feature request related to a problem?

Telegram enables the users to easily delete individual messages and entire chat: simply choose "delete" then click "yes". Unfortunately, this also allows for easy accidental deletion, with little chance of recovery. The problem is exacerbated by Telegram's own frequent "new feature" notifications, which many users are used to deleting, since they are impossible to archive.

Describe the solution you'd like

I suggest redoing the way that Telegram deletes messages, so as to minimize or entirely prevent the chance of accidental deletion of chats.

Describe alternatives you've considered

1. Allow the user to customize the number of seconds for which the "undo deletion" pop-up appears, and make it so that it cannot be "clicked away" until the time runs out.
2. Add a "bin" or "recover chats" option next to the option to export data, and move both options from the "advanced" settings to the "data and storage" settings. Of course, recovery should only be available for messages deleted by that user, and for a limited - but customizable - time (eg. one hours or one week).
3. Add an option for automatic backups.

In addition, the ability to export individual chats should be available not only from the in-chat three-dot menu, but also by right-clicking on a chat in the chat list; and it should be possible to archive Telegram's notifications like any other chat.

[ilya-fedin]

Unfortunately, this also allows for easy accidental deletion, with little chance of recovery.

How do you imagine a non-easy one? Should there be a ten of "are you sure" dialogs instead of one or what? The dialog already calls for the user to verify what he deletes, if he doesn't care, nothing will help.

[morags]

People can care and still not notice, or accidentally dismiss. I'm suggesting what I posted above, under "alternatives".

[ilya-fedin]

It's not clear what the solution you would like

[ilya-fedin]

The alternative options seem to require too much customization while tdesktop prefers to avoid adding settings

[morags]

I'll clarify:
The prospect of a user losing years' worth of chats in one absent-minded moment is too severe to let pass. The solution can be more or less customizable, but it has to exist. I'm suggesting three alternatives:

1. A longer-lasting and more obvious "undo deletion" popup
2. A "trash" folder or "recover chats" feature
3. Optional automatic backups

With respect to customization, I think this is less a concern given the amount of customization that already exists for features that are far less important (for example, there are ten different settings for "where to animate stickers"), so adding customization that could prevent the user from experiencing data loss should be seen as a priority. What's more, the first two options can be realized with zero customizations: for example, the pop-up stay time can be lengthened to 30s, and it can be designed to be more difficult to dismiss by accident (cf. Gmail design for the "unsend" pop-up); and Telegram's notifications can be allowed to archive (or otherwise dismissed) rather than delete, so as to avoid conditioning the users to deleting chats when there's no real reason for them to do so.

[Goosegit11]

Once when deleting chat messages (I was an admin) I accidentally clicked the "Delete all messages from user" checkbox and everything was deleted. it's really sad.

[MikeMilligan]

This just happened to me and I lost more than 5 years of conversations with a friend.

I was going to delete a message and I guess I wasn't paying attention and deleted the whole chat. I know it was my fault, but at least the Android version gives you an "Undo" option. So it would be nice to have that on the desktop software or a trash like someone else suggested.

[Harniver]

Similar thing just happened to me, losing lots of relevant information, cannot overstate how frustrated I currently am. I was on telegram web, so no "undo" banner at all showed up. I wanted to delete a few messages, didn't see the delete on the bottom and went for the delete on top (that was for the chat instead), assumed the banner was asking confirmation for deleting the messages and clicked "yes". This I think is a mistake that can easily happen, and the outcome is so frustrating to make you think switching to a different messaging app...

To me, the "trash" folder showing recently-deleted chat is a must-have feature that should have top priority.

[Aokromes]

platform wide bugs / requests belongs to https://bugs.telegram.org/

[john-preston]

@Harniver Can you please share a screenshot with those two Delete buttons? On the web version you are talking about. This isn't relevant to this repository at all, but I'm curious.

[Harniver]

There's the screenshot:

Of course it was a mistake, and if you are careful enough you'll notice you're doing things wrong, but in your life you can't be always careful enough for every thing you do.

[john-preston]

Well, it is "Delete Chat" text, not just "Delete". Ok, I see. Anyway, there is nothing I can do. Although in TDesktop there is a "Clear history" / "Delete conversation" buttons as well, with a single warning-confirm box.

[Harniver]

Of course if you're not doing things in a rush you'll notice and do the right thing, but it is still a good idea to try to prevent errors that can be easily done if you're rushing a bit!