EA0: Tangle Early Access Release Notes

The notes below pertain to the Early Access Release, 1.0.4963

In This Update:

• What's new?
• What's coming in September
• Known Issues
• Missing Features that will make a return in Q4!
• What’s Been Removed (for good)
• Here’s where you can find Tangle support moving forward

What's new?

• All new UI + UX. This remains WIP through September, but we're stepping up the visual presentation and usability of Tangle.
  • New Login Experience
  • New Server Select
  • New Room Editing Flow
  • All new UI and presentation across the app
  • There are many small adjustments still to come! We'd love feedback on how these fixes are changing your Tangle experience
• A new technical foundation that'll allow us to deploy faster and build cooler stuff.
• Auto-Magic Error Reporting to Tangle HQ
  • No more sending us error logs! All errors are now logged and reported back to the team.
• Lobbies
  • Lobbies are a default, central room that lives at the center of your Tangle. New users will always start here.
  • This solves the problem of new users starting in a space that was covered by stuff and begins to lay the groundwork for guests or part-time users.
• Multi-select/move for objects
  • Click-and-drag to select multiple objects and move them around with ease!
• New sound effects (knocking sound is less scary now!!) 
  • This is definitely a WIP, but we've got all new audio for everything
  • That's right, no more terrifying door knocks. 
  • Definitely let us know how you feel about these!
• Cursor Modes
  • We now have multiple cursor modes:
    • Shared Cursor Mode allows you to share your pointer with the whole server. Super helpful for gesturing to a specific stickie, room or place in your Tangle
    • Grabby Hand allows to grab and move your position in Tangle. This is available on your mouse, also, but for dedicated trackpad users it offers some flexibility. 
      • These can be combined to navigate and demonstrate at the same time. 
    • And regular ol' private pointer mode is still available as the default option.
• Updated Admin Panel
  • The Admin Panel is now a little cleaner and easier to use.
  • Invite Members has been rolled out to everyone and it takes fewer clicks to do everything
  • UX here remains a WIP, so let us know what hurts!
• Zendesk Documentation
  • We moved all of our documentation to our new support platform, ZenDesk! We hope you'll find it easier to get the help you need- Please leave comments on articles that are insufficient or feel free to let us know where you needed help and couldn't find it. This is very much an ongoing project! 
• ZenDesk Support
  • You can now file a support ticket to get help instead of just e-mailing or sending us a DM! This will give both parties better visibility on resolution, response time and status. 

What's coming in September

Rather than hit y'all with a wall of text, we'd like to introduce our Roadmap Portal. This is an easy way to see what's coming up next, read about new features in-depth and provide feedback directly to the absurd:joy team!

Our next update is planned for October 5th, but we may nudge that by about a week to give us additional QA and Release Management time- We'll keep y'all in the loop!

In the meanwhile, here's a preview of what we're working on this month:

• Avatar Customization
  • We had really hoped to have Avatar Customization available for this build, but it's a huge feature with a lot of moving parts. We're hard at work to get it done in September!
  • If you want a preview, right click on your User Panel and select "Customize" for the debug view. Please note that these are placeholder assets, but you start to get a feel the level of depth and creativity we're aiming for!

• User List
  • The User List is a fold out menu that allows you to see all of the Users and Rooms in a Tangle and to travel to any one of them with a single click. Super handy for new users or a busy Tangle!
• Updated Knocking Flow
  • Rather than just getting a mysterious knock, you'll be presented with a dialog telling you who's knocking and if you'd like to Allow/Deny them access. This gives everyone greater clarity on the knock process and affords Closed Door users better visibility on visitors.
• Performance Optimization & Fixes
  • We know performance in OG Tangle was a big issue for a lot of users. Performance in nu Tangle is overall better but we also have a number of dedicated performance fixes we'll be rolling out starting in September to help Tangle more smoothly integrate into your day!
• UX & UI Polish
  • While the overall UX and UI of Tangle has taken a lightspeed jump forward there are still many small fixes in the pipeline to help things feel more cohesive and be more responsive. Please be vocal about your pain points as we roll these out.
• Audio Polish
  • New SFX are rolling in weekly and you'll hear lots more audio feedback as they get integrated. Additionally, all audio currently plays for all users right now- We have a list of global & local SFX rules that we'll be putting into place.
• Better UX around Zoom Levels
  • Navigating a Tangle zoomed out is convenient for large servers, but it can be hard to parse room names and use the UI. We have a dedicated set of rules and UX to help make Tangle navigable at all zoom levels. 

Known Issues

• Settings Panel
  • The settings panel is currently a debug menu with lots of programmer art. We're working to get this shiny and usable, but all the options should work as described. 
• Zoom Levels
  • At the farthest zoom level a Tangle can be difficult to parse. We have a whole suite of fixes for these issues that we're hoping to deploy in September and October. 
• Screenshare Issues
  • Screenshare on MacOS does not work at all right now. Many of us are Mac users, so we feel your pain and are working on a fix.
  • Screenshare UI right now is a debug menu. 
  • Sharing a monitor other than your main display may create an error.
    • A workaround here is to share a Window in your second display as opposed to the whole monitor
  • Sharing a minimized window will cause the display to render incorrectly. 
• Images
  • There's currently no User-facing error handling for images. If you upload an image that's too large (10mb cap) or an unsupported format, it simply won't appear.
• Control Bar
  • On rare occasions it sometimes takes more than one click to activate Mute or Video Mute when using the UI. 

Missing Features that will make a return in Q4!

• Confetti
• Nice Towne / Joke Dungeon
• Audio Wiggles
• Avatar Reactions
• Stackies
• Whoopsie Mute
• Timers
  • Timers are getting a big UX overhaul to make them actually useful.

What’s Been Removed from Tangle (for good)

• Whiteboards
  • This did not offer a positive or reliable experience. We will look into restoring them in the future if we can find a great replacement.
• Embedded Browsers
  • Ultimately, embedded browsers were a cool feature that did not live up to their potential. They were expensive from a performance standpoint and from a download size standpoint.
  • We’re working on a replacement for smart, responsive URL sharing and embedding in Tangle that should ship before the end of 2022

Here’s where you can find Tangle support moving forward:

• Tangle Help Center - We’re migrating our Tangle guide from Notion over to here (Zendesk) where you can more easily search documentation and submit tickets–all in one place!
• Tangle Slack- We’re moving Tangle live support from Discord to Slack! Join the Slack here.
• Tangle Calendly- For 1:1 voice or video calls with a Tangle team member
• If you prefer email, you can reach us directly at shout@absurdjoy.com.

Whether you’ve been using Tangle for a year or a month, your feedback has been SO important to us as we continue to experiment and iterate to make sure Tangle meets all your needs and wishes. We’d love to keep hearing what you think. You know where to find us!

Happy Tangling,

-the Absurdists