Make send-on-enter the default with chatmail relay addresses

Feature Proposal
1

A long time ago, we disabled enter-to-send by default, because for email users it is much worse to accidentally send a message than it is for chatmail users to accidentally add a new line instead of sending: Send on Ctrl+Enter - #9 by r10s

Now we have chat-only accounts, which can not start their experience with sending an email. For them it is completely harmless if pressing enter accidentally sends a message, they can even edit or delete it now.

Then again, for new users it is pretty annoying that sending messages is more difficult than it needs to be, and many don’t try to look in the settings.

I propose that we make it the default if we detect that the user uses a chatmail address :slight_smile:

5 Likes
2

I think this is a great suggestion, it would certainly make the Deltachat + Chatmail experience more similar to other messaging apps.

1 Like
3

I like the idea but I am a bit concerned about the different defaults per account, but yeah with editing/deleting options it is less of a problem nowdays

2 Likes
4

I guess it’s not clear to me how many folks use Deltachat for with a regular email account and for sending regular email, versus “instant messaging”, with a Chatmail relay or not.

Now that Chatmail relays are becoming more widely available it will change a bit? I’m not sure if anyone has insight on this one, but I do still like the idea of “hit return/enter to send”.

5

I have only ever encountered delta as an instant messaging app so I don’t really understand the other perspective. You can send email with it?

I did eventually find the setting so I’m good but I do remember that I almost bounced off this because of that small UI quirk.

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6

I also switch the default setting to sending directly with return, so it would be okay for me to

I use DC a lot for email, especially for answering

1 Like
7

made a poll on the fediverse to get a mood picture. and for good measure you can vote here too.

  • Keep: Enter inserts newline
  • Change: Enter Sends
0 voters

This is only about changing the default, both options would still exist and the other shortcuts will stay the same:

  • Ctrl/Cmd + Enter is always send
  • Shift + Enter is always newline

Users that have previously changed the setting will keep their preference.

8

I assume this is just for desktop, since mobile already has a dedicated send button?

Is this poll, like @missytake suggested above, only for the cases where a chatmail address is detected?

9

The poll doesn’t actually reflect the question of this thread. This thread is not about changing the default for all Delta Chat profiles, only for chatmail relay addresses. If you login to a classic email account, the default would still be “Enter inserts newline”.

10

this desktop setting is not per profile, it is per install.

sure we could set the “default” on setting up the first profile, if that’s what we want.

11

having different shortcut behaviour depending on which profile (EDIT: or chat or smth else) is selected, would require always perfectly concentrated acting users and is a call for trouble. let alone guessing which shortcut new profiles get.

as we know this “always concentrated acting user” is far from reality, it is pretty clear that the original proposal will result in more accidentally sent messages. even if we have “edit” and “delete for all” now, it is questionable if that makes sense

sometimes, best thing to do is to do nothing :wink: - which is still hard to figure out

3 Likes
12

Now that we have a clear separation between chat messages (where you can edit messages) and email chats (where you can’t and it’s unencrypted), we could turn on “enter-to-send” in encrypted chats :slight_smile:

It could cause problems with users writing to PGP-encrypted Thunderbird contacts, where you can’t edit; not sure we can accept that.

1 Like
13

TBH I use newlines in chat messages, for lists and quotes and so on.

2 Likes
14

I also never use enter-sends and the behavior is bound to cause surprises for first time users, if one wants it one can enable it but I dont see reasons for it to be the default, is it the default in WhatsApp, Telegram and Signal??? if yes then sounds more reasonable if it is widespread

15

iirc, it is the default for at least some messengers, there is a rough split between “chatty” and “productivity” ones, where we would probably meanwhile chose the “chatty” side, indeed. however, other “chatty” messengers often group messages together, making default-send-on-enter a little less distracting. just saying, as we do not have grouping and this is also no prio atm. the older arguments wrt classic email expectation, otoh, are far less valid today.

however, this thread was originally about different settings/defaults per profile, and that would be a call for trouble, even if we have delete-after-sending, it is unneeded noise.

so, if at all, we should change it alltogether, and i am not so sure about that being an overall improvement.

it is mostly the same few ppl asking for it, most other seem to be happy or do not care. it is also the question if we want ppl to send shorter messages by default. this is what will happen, esp. as many ppl do not go to settings nor know about ctrl-enter. polls here and on mastodon, even tho voters are more nerdy and not representative, also do not justify a change. i heard far more ppl asking for input field being too small in the past, btw, which points to the exact other direction

so, the pressure of outer consistency must be larger than the noise we would produce internally, ppl will get unwanted sent messages, eg new installations, ppl explaining it to their friends etc. so there must be a very good reason.

tl;dr not totally against, but i stay sceptical and would not rush here. it is no prio and things are fine so far

2 Likes