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When switching between the wikitext and visual editors, the "Discard changes" option should require confirmation before losing all my work
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Description

Steps to grief:

  1. Make lots of changes.
  2. Decide to switch to the other editor for just a moment.
  3. Accidentally click "Discard changes" when you meant "Keep changes".
  4. Cry.

Desirable process:

  1. Make lots of changes.
  2. Decide to switch to the other editor for just a moment.
  3. Accidentally click "Discard changes" when you meant "Keep changes".
  4. Get an extra confirmation step that says something like, "You're kidding, right? All that work and you just want to flush it down the drain?"
  5. Click "Argh, it was a mistake! Keep my work!"
  6. Breathe a sigh of relief.
  7. Finished editing.
  8. Safely save all changes.

Event Timeline

Whatamidoing-WMF raised the priority of this task from to Needs Triage.
Whatamidoing-WMF updated the task description. (Show Details)

This problem appears to happen only when going visual-to-wikitext, not the other way around. Perhaps the web browser doesn't think that you're actually leaving the page?

This problem appears to happen only when going visual-to-wikitext, not the other way around. Perhaps the web browser doesn't think that you're actually leaving the page?

Uhh... You mean it doesn't prompt you to keep changes or not when switching from WTE into VE?

If you are going WT to VE, and choose to discard your changes, then the browser prompts you to confirm. If you are going VE to WT, it does not request confirmation.

Confirmation (=ask me twice whether I want to throw away all that work) should be required in both directions, not just one.

Are you saying we currently have double confirmation one way but not the other? We should fix that by only asking once...

Jdforrester-WMF claimed this task.
Jdforrester-WMF subscribed.

We shouldn't double-ask ever.

James, do you really mean that if I accidentally click "discard two hours of work", that the work should just permanently disappear, with no effort to confirm whether I meant to throw it all away?