Show warning for permanent deletion; no warning otherwise

[reidprichard]

What feature or improvement do you think would benefit Files?

First off, love the app. Incredible work!

One thing I miss about Windows Explorer is its style of deletion warnings. When a file is deleted to the recycle bin, it does not provide a warning, but it does warn you for permanent deletions, such as 1) deleting a file from a network drive and 2) deleting a file with the shift+delete hotkey.

From what I can tell, Files seems to be all-or-nothing, warning in all cases when the option "Folders > Show confirmation dialog when deleting items" is enabled and never warning when the option is disabled.

Requirements

The "show confirmation dialog when deleting items" preference will have three options:

• "Always warn": whenever a file is deleted, a confirm dialog will appear.
• "Never warn": no confirmation dialog will be shown for file deletion.
• "Warn for permanent deletions": in the case of permanent deletions (e.g., deleting a file from a network drive, or deleting a file with the shift+delete shortcut), a confirmation dialog will be shown. When files are deleted to the recycle bin, no confirmation dialog will be shown.

Files Version

2.4.25.0

Windows Version

Edition Windows 11 Home Version 22H2 Installed on ‎9/‎30/‎2022 OS build 22621.1105 Experience Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.22638.1000.0

Comments

No response

[yaira2]

Show confirmation dialog when deleting items

Turning this off will no longer show a confirmation dialog. We used to show a prompt when permanently deleting items but we got a ton of feedback asking for us to change the behavior to what we have today.

[reidprichard]

Wow, really? I would have thought that would be the minority view. Is having three options as I suggested too complicated?

[yaira2]

Based on the current feedback, an extra option would complicate stuff.

[Josh65-2201]

It would make sense to have it show for permeant delete except for the recycle bin since the user already knows that it will be permanent.

[hishitetsu]

It seems that the current Files always brings up a confirmation dialog when emptying the trash. I think that should be left as it is.
Should we add a new setting to confirm permanent deletion?
Or, should the dialog always appear regardless of the setting?

[Josh65-2201]

If you have the confirmation dialog turned off it doesn't when selecting and deleting the items using the right click menu. With the tool bar it make sense to have as its easier to accidentally click as it always out and next to the restore button.

[yaira2]

It would make sense to have it show for permeant delete except for the recycle bin since the user already knows that it will be permanent.

We used to but users complained

[reidprichard]

It seems that the current Files always brings up a confirmation dialog when emptying the trash. I think that should be left as it is. Should we add a new setting to confirm permanent deletion? Or, should the dialog always appear regardless of the setting?

I agree that it makes sense to always warn when emptying the trash. However, this is inconsistent with the behavior where permanent deletions elsewhere are treated no differently.

One large reason I would find this useful is that I often work from a NAS with no recycle bin. When deleting files, it's nice to have the reminder that deletion will be permanent so that I am forced to stop and think whether I really should delete the file before I click okay. In contrast, I give little thought to deleting files locally as I know there will be a long period where they are accessible in my recycle bin (not to mention that anything important is backed up to cloud storage).

[hishitetsu]

How about this?

[yaira2]

A ComboBox is a really good idea and solves the concerns I had.

[hishitetsu]

Ok, I will make it later.