Save over 40% when you secure your tickets today to TNW Conference 💥 Prices will increase on November 22 →

This article was published on October 9, 2017

Rant: Slack’s drag-and-drop bug has been driving me crazy for 6 months


Rant: Slack’s drag-and-drop bug has been driving me crazy for 6 months

One time. This was all it took me to fall in love with Slack. But my infatuation with the team collaboration tool has been gradually wearing off over the past few months – largely due to a glaring bug in the chat client the company seems to be frivolously neglecting.

Slack has a handy drag-and-drop feature that makes it easy to quickly upload and share images with colleagues. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work as intended.

The functionality appears to be affected by a glitch that is unexpectedly causing the app to reboot when users hover an image over the client’s window.

You can see what happens here:

Webinar: Unicorn DNA: The Blueprint for Scaling Success

What does it take to build a unicorn? On November 19, 3pm CET, top executives of unicorn companies will reveal the mindset, strategies, and innovative thinking that propelled their companies to the top.

Register Now

For the record, the bug tends to affect Slack sporadically. The drag-and-drop feature would work fine most of the times, but when it doesn’t – it is particularly rage-inducing.

The worst part is that it would literally happen when you expect it the least: Like when you’re dragging an image to upload to Gmail, but you accidentally hover it over Slack.

Chances are not all users have experienced this: The flaw appears to be limited exclusively to Mac users (Windows fans can insert their crappy Mac wisecracks here).

But those that have experienced it are growing increasingly restless with the bug. Indeed, numerous miffed users have taken to Twitter to complain about the glitch so far. Here are a couple examples:

Slack has since registered this negative feedback, confirming its team is looking further into the matter.

In fact, the company has already promised a fix on at least several occasions: While it initially acknowledged the flaw in April, it again reassured us it is working on a solution in May, August, September and October.

This much-needed solution has yet to make it to the official app though – and there is still no clear timeline when the promised update will roll out.

Yes, bugs are nothing unusual in the world of software engineering. But it is straight-up unprofessional when a company boasting more than six million daily active users is taking over six months to eliminate a well-known technical issue – especially when a bug is proving to be as big of a frustration to users as this one.

Here is the kicker though: This is literally the worst time for Slack to be pissing off its users, to say the least.

The titans of the industry are already patiently scheming to take the team communication market over – and this could spell trouble for Slack big time.

The list of companies that have released a “Slack competitor” over the past year so far includes Microsoft and its Teams app, Google and its revamped Hangouts, Facebook and its Workspace, and last but not least, Atlassian and its Hipchat-powered Stride platform.

The truth is that the bench is getting deeper by the day: Slack starts up along with my MacBook today, but it could easily take a backseat to any of the still up-and-coming alternatives tomorrow.

At the end of the day, software is as good as it does its job, and Slack is as replaceable as the next big thing to hit the team communication market.

Get the TNW newsletter

Get the most important tech news in your inbox each week.

Also tagged with