Proposal: Channel management and ownership transfer for global administrators

[pooh-winnie]

Problem Statement

Currently, global administrators create many channels, which continuously accumulate in their list. The administrator cannot leave these channels. This clutters the interface and complicates management.

Proposed Idea / Workflow

We need a dedicated mode or workflow for global administrators when they want to leave a channel:

1. Mandatory Ownership Transfer: Before leaving, the administrator must transfer channel moderator rights to one of the remaining active users.
2. Global Admin Exit: Once a moderator is assigned, the global administrator can successfully leave the channel to clean up their personal channel list.
3. Chain of Succession: If the newly assigned moderator decides to leave the channel later, the system should automatically assign moderator rights to the next active participant.
4. Channel Cleanup: If the last remaining participant (moderator) leaves the channel and it becomes completely empty, the channel should either be automatically deleted or archived for the global administrator.

Benefits

This approach prevents channel accumulation for administrators, ensures continuous moderation for active channels, and automates cleanup for abandoned ones.

[ancsemi]

Thanks for writing this up so clearly. The ownership transfer plus succession flow makes sense, but it is a larger behavior change touching leave rules, role assignment, and empty-channel lifecycle. I have this noted for scoped design work so we can land it safely without breaking current moderation logic.

[ancsemi]

Came back to this one. Rather than the full ownership-transfer flow, I went with a simpler approach that fits the actual problem: as an admin you need to stay in every channel, so instead of leaving you can now hide a channel from your own sidebar.

Right-click any channel and pick "Hide Channel" (admin only). It just removes it from your view on that device, nothing changes for anyone else and you keep full access. A little "N hidden channels" bar shows up at the bottom of the channel list where you can unhide them one at a time or all at once.

It's pushed to main, so it'll be in the next build. Let me know if that covers what you needed.

[pooh-winnie]

Hi @ancsemi,

You are absolutely right, your solution perfectly solves the immediate problem. Thank you for such a quick implementation!

Since you mentioned this approach, I have a few suggestions for future improvements that could be useful not just for admins, but for all users:

1. Smart/Auto-Hide (UI Improvement): Instead of manually hiding channels, it would be amazing to have an option (e.g., in Account Settings) to automatically hide channels that have no unread messages. If a new message arrives or the channel becomes active, it automatically pops back into the sidebar. Users could also "pin" specific channels to keep them visible permanently.
2. State Storage (Architecture): Right now, you mentioned the hidden state is saved per device (locally).
   • Storing the last opened channel or purely layout-based states locally (LocalStorage) makes total sense (especially to persist it after a page reload).
   • However, for pinned channels or explicit exclusions, it would be much better to store them in the Database. This way, a user's curated sidebar stays synchronized across different devices.

This might be a repeat of Organize channels ?

Thanks again for the great work on this issue!

[ancsemi]

Glad it covers the immediate need, and thanks for the thoughtful follow-ups.

Both of those are good directions. The auto-hide-when-no-unread idea (with pinning to keep specific channels always visible) is a nicer UX than manual hiding, and you're right that pins/explicit exclusions belong in the database so they sync across devices rather than living in per-device local storage like the current hide does. And yes — this does overlap with the "Organize channels" thread, so I'd rather design it there as one coherent sidebar-curation feature instead of bolting more onto the hide mechanism piecemeal.

I'll keep this open as the reference for the admin/declutter case. Appreciate the detail you put into writing it up.

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