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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

#171

Post by hazz99 »

ghostcluster wrote: post #70
dicytea wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The WYSIWYG editor is being gradually rolled out over the coming days – if you don't see it in some workspaces, just hang tight, you will soon. " Not to mention, unintentional threats.

This attitude to their rollout reminds me of the recent rollout of Twitter's maligned new desktop UI, the new YouTube Studio Beta, and reddit's new UI. There is almost a meme of online platform service providers not understanding their users and their workflows, and rolling out new revisions that hamper or outright remove functionality that those users rely on. I guess the canonical example would be that one Digg red…

> online platform service providers not understanding their users and their workflows

In regards to the Reddit redesign, I think the people complaining that "they ignore their users" are stuck inside a bit of a bubble.

I have a lot of friends who recently discovered the site, and they much prefer the redesign to the old one.

I forgot where I read it, but I vaguely remember stats backing this up, or at least increase in engagement or a reduction in churn for new users following the redesign.

Something like 50% of Reddit users are on mobile, for which the redesign is targeted (I believe)

Re: Slack, I know many non-techies who struggle with markdown and would welcome a WYSIWYG editor with open arms and wide smiles.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#172

Post by swader999 »

danShumway wrote: post #139
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…

> The goal is for workflows to evolve This exchange is a pretty good summation of one of the biggest purely practical reasons why I'm so obsessive about tools, and why I'm so willing to put up with the initial cost of learning systems like Linux and Vim/Emacs. Outside of fundamentally better workflow improvements, most professional fields don't randomly change their tools. If you gave a professional artist a new penc…

Equipment is critical in pro sports, especially the more technical ones too.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#173

Post by 3pt14159 »

snowe2010 wrote: post #145
3pt14159 wrote: post #102

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 ou…

wait what is happening to the subdomain?

Everything is switching to app.slack.com for now it redirects but it used to be simple to know where you were and how to get to it.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#174

Post by beatgammit »

vailripper wrote: post #99
nerdponx wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know what else has a terrible WYSIWYG editor? Microsoft Teams. It's kind of sort of like Markdown, except when it isn't, or when it breaks. At least it's a step up from Lync.

Sounds like Atlassians approach with Jira - "it supports markdown, except when it doesn't!"

All I want is consistent syntax for links, italics, and bulleted lists, bonus points for numbered lists, bold, and code blocks. I don't want to have to click stuff when typing, and I don't want to remember keyboard shortcuts with subtle differences between different services.

Markdown is good enough, yet for some reason, each platform finds it necessary to do something slightly differently. I really don't care about a WYSIWIG editor, as long as I can use straight text if I want. Basically, I want Reddit comments in instant messaging and bug trackers.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#176

Post by GiorgioG »

Slack is dead, they just don’t know it yet. Give Microsoft 2 years to keep grinding on Teams, continue to drive corporate adoption and slowly kill off Slack’s income.

I’m not a fan of Teams, but at work we’re switching Slack because we get it as part of our licensing agreement (3,000ish users.)

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#177

Post by cakoose »

For me, if you type:

    when you do `foo()` it foos the bar.
It does the right thing for me. This was the case yesterday and it still is today.

It's possible that the author got a different release. It's also possible that the author was trying other very similar scenarios that behave differently, e.g. backquotes behaves differently at word boundaries and inside a span that has already been converted to the code-formatted rendering.

Overall it's pretty confusing, but the simple case that the original article points out works fine.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#178

Post by tln »

gregmac wrote: post #166
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.

The changing behaviour of enter/shift+enter in code block drives me absolutely crazy. Normally, shift+enter is newline, enter is send. However, inside a code block, it's the opposite. I constantly forget this and press shift+enter for a newline while in the code block and accidentally send a half-finished message. Sad to see the new WYSIWYG editor does exactly the same thing.

I'm not seeing this behavior. Are you sure you don't have a setting changed? Under Preferences > Advanced,

When typing code with ```, Enter should not send the message. With this checked use ShiftEnter to send.

Might be an easy fix :)

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#179

Post by lonelappde »

jakebasile wrote: post #49
p1necone wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It reads more to me like whoever they hire to run their twitter doesn't have the authority/knowledge to engage with complaints other than being nice and saying "I'll pass that on". This would be fine normally, but not really when they've shipped a feature that everyone hates.

I know. I try to give the social media people leeway since they're almost always just the messengers. This thread in particular just seemed laser targeted to aggravate me.

If you are taking a job with you are specifically being paid to be a human shield, I am not going to hold back from treating you like the face of the company you are. The more abuse these mercenaries take, the more the corp has to pay to staff them, and the more the owners feel the pain of their misdeeds.

Re: Slack’s new WYSIWYG input box is terrible

#180

Post by swader999 »

haberman wrote: post #73
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…

Is there any way that tweet could have been written that would have satisfied you, without actually agreeing to change course right away? To me the tweet's tone says that they honestly care and don't want people to be inconvenienced, but also want to at least see if people will warm to it. There has to be some kind of healthy balance between listening to user feedback and never changing anything. The extreme version…

It needs the PM and the team that championed this gong show to step up and own the reply.
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