Review of Advanced and Legacy settings in the app

[churik]

Problem

Following up on this comment:

Currently, the settings we have in Advanced and Legacy are not clearly understandable for users, and some of them were added without the involvement of the QA team.

We need to define how these settings should be used and whether we should remove or hide those that are no longer in use.

Advanced:

• Log Level: Used by both the QA and development teams.
• Fleet: Used by both the QA and development teams.
• Waku V2 Settings: There is no information regarding when this was added or its purpose. It recently caused a crash on tap, which has since been fixed.
• Peers Stat: Used by the QA team.
• Light Client: Enabled by default and currently in use.
• Store Confirmations: Disabled by default. This is a debug setting that was used to show store confirmations, which were unstable. It is not currently used by the QA team but may be useful for debugging in the future.
• Peer Syncing: The purpose and expected functionality of this toggle are unclear.

Legacy Settings:

• Sync Settings, which comprise:
  1. Backup Setting (Enabled by default): Used for backing up Waku and can also be used to perform backups. Utilized by the QA team.
  2. Sync History For: I believe (though I'm not 100% certain) that this was implemented only for Waku 1 and was never migrated to V2. This allows us to fetch history from the mail server for more than 24 hours (up to 1 month).
  3. Status Nodes: Configurable store nodes for V1. This was not implemented for V2 and is a leftover from the "Sync Settings" in V1. Relevant issue: #20490 regarding migration from V1.
  4. Devices: Old pairing; if devices were paired on V1, they remain paired on V2. This can also be removed and is a leftover from the "Sync Settings" in V1.

Acceptance criteria

Advanced Settings

• Waku V2 Settings

  • Investigate when this setting was added and its intended purpose.
  • Assess whether this setting should be retained or removed.

• Store Confirmations

  • Evaluate the necessity of this debug setting.
  • Determine if it should be kept for potential future debugging use or removed.

• Peer Syncing

  • Clarify the purpose and expected functionality of this toggle.
  • Decide whether it should be retained or removed.

Legacy Settings

• Sync Settings

  • Review the following components:

  • Backup Setting

    • Confirm its current usage
    • Identify the place for it, might be moved to Advanced?

  • Sync History For

    • Decide whether it should be retained or removed.

  • Status Nodes

    • Determine if this setting is still relevant, given that it was not implemented for V2.
    • Decide whether it should be retained or removed.

  • Devices

    • Assess if this old pairing feature should be removed, as it is leftover from V1.

Additional Information

• Status version: nightly 01/10/24
• Operating System: Android, iOS

[churik]

Note: I'd vote for just moving useful leftovers from legacy to advanced

[churik]

linking to #21375

It is crucial for us + WAKU team to know to which mailserver app is currently connected. Currently it is not possibel

[ilmotta]

Hey @status-im/design-team, in this issue, per discussion with @churik, she has analyzed the current state of the advanced and legacy settings in the app. In release 2.32, we might have the opportunity to complete the work of reorganizing advanced & legacy settings onto different screens or redesigning some of them, similar to what we did with the privacy and security settings prior to release 2.30. We can't promise we will have capacity for that, but some changes might be rather doable in a short period of time.

The advanced and legacy settings are user-facing features and I believe they shouldn't be in the abandoned state they are in now.

It would be great to hear from the Design team how you think the settings should be structured and presented to users. What do you say, after the release 2.31 is published we overview the settings and eventually agree on the designs?

Thank you

[Francesca-G]

The advanced and legacy settings are user-facing features and I believe they shouldn't be in the abandoned state they are in now.

It would be great to hear from the Design team how you think the settings should be structured and presented to users. What do you say, after the release 2.31 is published we overview the settings and eventually agree on the designs?

Agree 💯
Alisher already has it in his backlog, thank you for the reminder!