Could there be a popup in the app after updates with possibly confusing changes?

I've finally updated to the most recent version of Joplin desktop. After the discussions about changes that have been made that affects user experience, it got me wondering. When there are changes like the latest one with the margins, could there be a popup notice (like the one that alerts you to new versions) that listed the major changes that might cause someone to have to head to the forum to ask questions?

I know some people won't read them. But if there was just a simple message that explained what was going on, it might help. They wouldn't have to be comprehensive. And perhaps there could even be a link to a discussion on the forum so people could get further help if needed.

BTW, perhaps changes like the margin setting could default to whatever the setting would have been before the update. For example, the width could have been set to zero. Then people who wanted the change could make it. Of course not all changes are like that.

What's the difference between this and popping up with a changelog before the update?

It seems the issue is that users are quickly closing popups without reading them (can't blame them). Maybe having a button in the app that links to the change log could help? If we go that route it wouldn't hurt to have a high level changelog that's a bit more detailed about user facing changes.

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Ah, I was going to address that, but thought I would see if anyone else thought about that.

What I'm thinking of is a narrower, more targeted popup. One of the reasons that we can't blame people for clicking through popups is that they contain too much, hard to understand information, at the wrong time.

Change logs are great and they should exist.

But what I'm talking about is a message that pops up in the moment the user has to deal with the issue. For example:

You are going to see a change in the editor!

There is now a margin added on the left and right side of the editor. You can turn this off, or set it to whatever you like, by going to
Tools>Options>Appearance>Editor maximum width.

For no margins, set it to zero

For more information about this change, visit the forum.

That's it.

If we wanted to be really fancy, there could be a gif demonstrating the change and how to fix it. For sure that would get people's attention.

Of course I know this is extra work for the developers, but perhaps they could make a post on the forum requesting help for things like this that those of us without coding ability could offer help with.

One thing I'm not sure of is how this will affect people who are upgrading several steps at a time. Would there be a pile up of notices? Would that break the effectiveness?

I just had a look at the popup change log that I don't normally read (due to keeping up to date with developments on the forum) and I definitely think it could be clearer about some aspects of the change. Also I assume this is only showing notes for the latest update version rather than cumulative changes from the version you are upgrading from (only notes from 2.3.3 and 2.3.5 it seems?)
i.e.
image

For your average user they are going to read this and assume that nothing much would change at all with their Joplin install.other than the 2.3 sync target change.
To me the wording of:

Improved: Allow setting a max width for the editor content

would imply that the improvement is that it has added the ability to apply such a setting but not that it would change by default nor that it would necessarily in the way that it does. Contrast this to the wording in the pinned topic

The latest version of Joplin sets a maximum width for the note content in order to improve readability

which highlights the change far more clearly, its direct consequences and its reasons. Personally I think the popup patch notes as @whitewall is suggesting, should be far more targeted at the casual, non forum user who is concerned about changes in the way the application is used or displayed rather than looking through a full changelog and looking through github PRs and commits and instead should focus on announcing (and celebrating!) in detail any major changes or new features that would directly affect the user experience (whilst still including the actual notes directly).

This is pretty common practice isn't it? I've definitely had my fair share of applications that bring up a stack of changes to flick through, each pertaining to each individual version.

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