Ability to Close Chat View on Element Web/Desktop like Intuitively on Android/iOS

[toymil]

On Android/iOS user can ‘go back’ from the chat view to close it, on Web/Desktop there seems to be no obvious way¹.

The reason user might want to do this is to avoid ‘reading’ new messages whenever they open the window (see also: #16703).

Something like a close (X) or go back (←) button in the chat view title bar would be nice.

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Footnote 1: Currently there is a keyboard shortcut only action “Go to Home View” (Ctrl + Alt + H) which can serve the purpose of close chat view, but it is by no means obvious to normal users, and a keyboard shortcut may not always work (#16692).

[t3chguy]

On instances with a defined Home Page there is such a button

[toymil]

Ok, but close chat should be a function available in all circumstances, so some sort of ‘close chat’ button should exist: a) in the chat view; b) for all chat views.
‘go to home’ just seems to be the suitable action for this job (given my limited knowledge), there might be a better way to do this. The intention is just to have the ability to exit a chat view.

[t3chguy]

so some sort of ‘close chat’ button should exist

What other apps have this? I don't see it in Discord or Slack

[toymil]

so some sort of ‘close chat’ button should exist

What other apps have this? I don't see it in Discord or Slack

1. In Discord, a well placed, obvious ‘Home’ button exist:
   
2. In Telegram Desktop, press Esc will exit chat view and back to chat list.

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Even if no other apps do this (which is not the case), such function still make sense for the reason described above:

to avoid ‘reading’ new messages whenever they open the window.

[t3chguy]

In Discord, a well placed, obvious ‘Home’ button exist:

That home button just takes you to your most recent DM, ftr Element will have a very similar behaviour with the ongoing Spaces work.

[toymil]

That home button just takes you to your most recent DM

🤔 You are right. I didn’t use Discord that much.
How about click ‘Home’ then click ‘Friends’ on the right?

Anyway, on Element Android/iOS you can always close chat view by ‘going back’ from it, I am just seeking the same function on Element Web/Desktop.

[DantrazTrev]

In Discord, a well placed, obvious ‘Home’ button exist:

That home button just takes you to your most recent DM, ftr Element will have a very similar behaviour with the ongoing Spaces work.

The add + communities button has a similar feature that takes you to add communities page , but it has a certain bug I think is unintentional, if you click the + (communities) button it switches between the community and recent room , however the actual group tab just enables and disable the filters

[toymil]

That is still just a workaround.

[jwsp1]

This might be related to #5057

[afranke]

FWIW going to https://app.element.io/#/home (or the equivalent for your instance) will bring you back to that view. Sadly, no UI is available to go there without having to mess with the URL.