Signal-android: Conversation colors inverted

[KommX]

• [x] I have searched open and closed issues for duplicates
• [x] I am submitting a bug report for existing functionality that does not work as intended
• [x] I have read https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Android/wiki/Submitting-useful-bug-reports
• [x] This isn't a feature request or a discussion topic

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Bug description

Situation until yesterday:
Every contact/conversation has a specific color, meaning that my contact's messages are red/blue/... in the conversation view. My messages all have the same color.
After updating to 4.28.0 the colors in my conversations are inverted, now my messages have a different color in every conversation but my contacts' messages all have the same color.
I hope that's not intended?!

Steps to reproduce

• Update to 4.28.0
• Open any conversation

Actual result: My messages are _colorful_.
Expected result: My contacts' messages are _colorful_.

Screenshots

Device info

Device: HTC U11 life
Android version: 8.1.0
Signal version: 4.28.0

[kreativmonkey]

Same problem here. I hope the whole thing is not so intended.

Device Info

Device: OnePlus 3
Android version: 8.1.0 (lineageOS)
Signal version: 4.28.0

[rainerzufall]

unfortunately it is an intended change. :/
See: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360016466812-Frequently-Asked-Questions-about-the-recent-changes-to-conversation-colors

Why do colors now appear on outgoing messages in Signal Android?
In group conversations, the color of a particular message bubble was the primary visual indicator of who sent the message. This would sometimes work in small groups, but colors quickly started to overlap when new members joined the conversation. With a large enough number of colors, we also moved past the limits of working memory.
By shifting colors to outgoing messages and adding new functionality to choose a color for group conversations, we were able to bring the sender's name and avatar to the top of the visual hierarchy while making it easier to quickly identify which group you are in based on the group color and group avatar.

[jpds]

I also found this to be a poor decision; if a person in a group quotes another person, that quote is displayed with the owner's colour and not the gray of the original message for example.

I think that in group chats the contact colours should correspond to what they are based on the 1-to-1 colour setting for the owner and the name should be displayed in conversation threads in the group. We also have the avatars to help distinguish who's who.

[TichyTichyTichy]

It's truly unfortunate. Reading group messages is so much more difficult now. Colors used to make it easy to associate messages with people across different conversations. Now I'm not really sure what function colors serve and I'm tempted to just unify the colors of all conversations since the color feels more associated with me than the individual I'm messaging. The tiny bit of color associated with a sender's circle is practically useless as a quick visual identification queue if they don't have an avatar in a group message.

12 colors may not be enough to uniquely identify everyone in a large group, but it's better than 0. Maybe at least give us an option to no longer use colors for speech bubbles but just sender icons and message headers? Chat bubble colors don't seem to serve a useful function any longer and are now just jarring visual clutter.

[dgx]

What a strange design change. And to make it without a configuration option to restore original behavior! Madness!!

[schmeat]

I don't quite follow the logic of the change. Colours overlapped for larger groups and they were taken away so that no group can utilitize it? That doesn't really make sense to me. Why not expand the colour pallet to be user selectable, rather than predefined by the developer?

[moxie0]

Please use the forums for discussion, thanks everyone.