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Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

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Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#101

Post by Throwaway656543 »

StavrosK wrote: post #39

At the risk of sounding like a shill, I'd like to shill Zulip. We started using it instead of Slack, and it has been amazing . It's fast, everything is designed to help you get to conversations quickly, keyboard accessibility is second to none and the streams is a much better default than rooms. I can't recommend it enough, it's well worth the money even though they have a nice free tier and are OSS so you can self-h…

When you announce that you're shilling something, you remove all chance of risk ;) That said, Zulip looks promising. Thanks for sharing.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#102

Post by 3pt14159 »

It's something so simple that they made complex. It's not just code formatting, even things like italics are annoying to escape from if you're used to the old interface.

Also, I totally understand their desire to get rid of the subdomain aspect of slack. As a developer I get it, I really do, but now there is no way to easily go in the browser to the slack that you want. It used to autocomplete now I have to figure out which slack is what and I get confused.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#103

Post by _jal »

jpalomaki wrote: post #96
jakebasile wrote: post #19

Reading their non-replies on Twitter feels like I'm reading something specifically designed to piss me off. Smarmy apologies, low empathy, cocksure of how correct their vision of a chat service should be. This one in particular[1]: > The goal is for workflows to evolve, but we realize change can be a bit of a pain. "Stupid peasant, we are only here to help you. Once you see the glorious vision we have you will thank…

I don't think Slack is building a chat service. Based on the features they are building, they could be aiming to be The Groupware[1] of 2020's. On the web site they put it this way "Slack is the collaboration hub that brings the right people, information, and tools together to get work done." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_software

That's a surefire path to irrelevance. Nobody wants groupware. Nobody uses it unless forced.

On the bright side, that would leave a hole in the market for an enterprising chat developer to fill, hopefully with something less annoying and resource intensive.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#104

Post by will_pseudonym »

harshalizee wrote: post #55

I wish Enterprise software or anything where I have to pay money to use had strict contracts about changes and mandatory opt-ins. It's ridiculous that in this day and age, we have to be worried about some PM deciding for large swathes of users what's best for them. I just want my tools to be predictable and usable and not have to relearn every bit of quirk someone fancied.

And it's insanely myopic that software companies don't understand that stability and predictability is a feature you best not mess with when it comes to _tools_.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#105

Post by ken »

livueta wrote: post #50

Specific bug gripes aside: I see this editor as emblematic of Slack's broader shift away from what I think it should be (primarily synchronous chat; irc with a friendlier ui and integrated bouncer features) towards what many people seem to want to use it as (async-heavy pseudo-replacement for email where I get to sit and watch the "...is typing" indicator flicker while somebody writes an essay at me). My rule of thum…

I personally have no problem with the hybridization of sync/async communication. That's where everything is headed. People send emails and sometimes expect them to be delivered and/or read immediately. OTOH, people send messages over these "chat" services that aren't time sensitive, simply because it's easy and available.

My problem is that all these networks are proprietary and isolated. When someone comes up with a really bad idea in their UI, you're SOL until they decide to fix it. When someone comes up with a really good idea, you have to hope their competitors re-implement it. And all they can do is gently try to guide their network into the place they want to occupy on the sync-async spectrum via features.

Looking back at the history of computing, I see that when a protocol is open and has many competing implementations, it lives on far beyond what the original designers ever intended. When a protocol is proprietary and implemented only by a single proprietary UI, it has a fairly short lifespan. What I can't tell is if these companies don't know their history, or if they think they're going to be the first ones ever to beat this trend, or if they don't care and just want to grab money while they can.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#107

Post by SwellJoe »

Jestar342 wrote: post #8

It is infuriatingly terrible. A regression. So many times I've had similar woes with the code block and quote block mechanisms too. Another truly bizarre feature I noted and sent a bug report about was that when adding an image to an "Action" the _minimum_ size requirement is 512px by 512px. For an image that is never rendered larger than 64x64.

All code sucks now, not just blocks. Inline code screws up at least half the time I use it; it tries to guess what I want, and sometimes doesn't end when I close it with another backtick. And, when going back and editing it sometimes carries the formatting outside of where I put the backticks.

So frustrating. I hate having to think every time I insert code and re-do it about half the time; I'd rather have no formatting (just show me the markdown as-is) than this mess.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#108

Post by pjscott »

Tade0 wrote: post #45

As someone who used to be part of a team developing one of the most popular in-browser WYSIWYG editors: 1. Browser WYSIWYGs are really hard to make. 2. All browser WYSIWYGs are terrible. Avoid rolling your own WYSIWYG if you can. Even if you have a team of 1500 people at your disposal.

Especially if you have a team of 1500 people. One person trying to make a browser WYSIWYG is bad enough; can you imagine how buggy it would be if 1500 people worked on it?

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#109

Post by Shoue »

Jestar342 wrote: post #8

It is infuriatingly terrible. A regression. So many times I've had similar woes with the code block and quote block mechanisms too. Another truly bizarre feature I noted and sent a bug report about was that when adding an image to an "Action" the _minimum_ size requirement is 512px by 512px. For an image that is never rendered larger than 64x64.

That's likely due to HiDPI displays. A regular display is probably in the 100 DPI range, but we have phones that are in the 400 DPI range, so that icon size suddenly isn't so big anymore.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#110

Post by drewg123 »

Androider wrote: post #91
drewg123 wrote: post #66

What I don't like about it is that it takes too much vertical space for the row of icons at the bottom. What I do like about it is that I'm forever pasting code snippets ``` code .. ``` and it saves me the time of entering the 3 backticks.

Press the "Aa" button and the row of icons goes away. Based on the title, I was dreading checking this out but... I kind of like it; Keyboard accelerators for dropping in and out of the various block and list modes, quick action for code etc.

Ah, nice. I hate how UIs these days require random clicking to discover.. Thanks for the tip!
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