More information in settings

Feature Proposal
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1

Actual behaviour

New Deltachat users don’t know what functionality the app has. The only way to figure out what some settings do is to try them and see; in some cases, even then, it isn’t obvious. In a high-risk situation, try-it-and-see is especially undesirable.

Requested behavior

Could we have more information on what the settings do, ideally offline?

For instance, if the setting name can’t make it clear, a quick :information_source: dropdown saying what a function is could be handy.

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What settings are unclear? There is an offline FAQ.

Some “Advanced” settings like “Only Fetch from DeltaChat Folder” we want to remove.

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I propose to add:

  • for ‘calls’ and ‘realtime channels’ switches - ‘will leak your IP address’
  • ‘may leak your IP address or other info’ for WebXDC (only on platforms where ‘500 connections’ workaround is used - or better on all of them, because the web browser is security nightmare).
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4

You mean where 500 connections workaround is not used?

5

yeah, thanks for the reminder. we’re always a bit behind the “offline help”, it easily gets outdated. as we barely manage to maintain that, we will probably not add more ways that need maintenance atm.

however, currently, we’re about to update the information, we already grouped “advanced” and shifted things otherwise to their sections, but there are things to do.

6

@link2xt, you are right, I was far too vague. I should have written a list of examples. If a bunch of changes are about to be implemented I should probably not make a swarm of obsolescent suggestions?

Propinquitous information, info that is accessible right where you are making a decision about a setting, seems more likely to be used. I did read through the FAQ, at least twice, and large parts of the blog and SecureJoin and Autocrypt docs, before installing a client, but that is probably not typical. And I did still find myself confused, and I found I’d forgotten some things. The interface is more complex now than it was then. Dividing it into subject-matter setions should help, though.

I’d think info integrated with the settings might also be easier to maintain than a separate FAQ, but perhaps I am wrong. What would be the easiest format?

An earlier specific suggestion simply linked a term (“read receipt”) to the relevant Wikipedia article, which does outsource the maintenance. :slight_smile:

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I guess more settings could have a direct link to the relevant section in the local help/FAQ

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