Skip to main content

Twitter app Fenix 2 wants to edit your bad tweets with ‘undo send’ feature

vdovichenko/123RF
If there is one feature the Twitter faithful have been clamoring for since the beginning of time, it is the ability to edit tweets. Twitter has been fielding requests for the feature as far back as anyone can remember and the refusal to give users what they want has only become more apparent by recent updates to the social media platform that have changed just about everything except what you can do immediately after firing off a tweet.

Fortunately, dilemmas such as these are why third-party Twitter clients exist. And one of the more well-known ones on Android, Fenix, is working on an update that could solve that problem — admittedly in a roundabout way.

pic.twitter.com/yOxtHQlPjl

— Matteo Villa (@mttvll) June 22, 2017

Matteo Villa, who is currently developing a significant upgrade to Fenix called Fenix 2, revealed on Twitter that he is testing a feature similar in practice to Gmail’s “undo send.” It would delay posting by a certain amount of time, providing a brief opportunity to take a tweet back after hitting the send button. In the example given, the editing window was five seconds, though Villa says it would be adjustable.

It’s not true editing, but if the favorable responses to the idea are any indication, most people do not seem to be very concerned. Many users compared the implementation to SMS app Textra, which provides a similar feature. Twitter actually released an update to its first-party app earlier this month intended to save users further embarrassment by issuing warnings for accidentally sending direct messages as public tweets.

In Fenix’s case, the tweet drops down from the top of the screen after being “sent.” A circular progress bar illustrates how much time is left to drop in and make any last-second changes. You can skip the delay with another send button, or hit cancel to bring up the compose window again. If you have a full-on change of heart and decide you made a mistake, you can delete the tweet just as you would a draft.

Fenix has been around for years, but Villa recently released a preview version of Fenix 2. You can take it for a spin for free, but Villa says the final release will be a paid upgrade. Be aware that the preview is still missing some more notable features, though you will still find an extensive suite of customization options for the interface and gestures to tailor the app to your usage.

Editors' Recommendations

Adam Ismail
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Adam’s obsession with tech began at a young age, with a Sega Dreamcast – and he’s been hooked ever since. Previously…
A new Twitter feature could separate the lurkers from the super-users
A Twitter logo graphic.

Twitter is apparently working on a new profile page feature that is both useful and annoyingly indiscreet.

According to a screenshot tweeted on Thursday by Jane Manchun Wong, Twitter has yet another in-progress feature -- this time, it's a tiny bit of text located just under the Tweets tab on a user's profile page. But this text tells everyone something you may not want others to know, which is how often you tweet.

Read more
Twitter is building two new ways to handle tweet replies
A person's hands holding a smartphone as they browse Twitter on it.

Replies on the bird app could be getting a makeover, as Twitter is apparently working on two new features that could shape how we respond to tweets.

On Wednesday, Jane Manchun Wong posted screenshots of two different reply-related features that Twitter is building. The first of Wong's tweets featured a screenshot that showed off an option to "Start a Space about this Tweet." And the second tweet Wong shared had a screenshot of a new "Pin Reply" feature.

Read more
6 Twitter features I want no matter who’s in charge
The Twitter app on the Sony XPeria 5 II.

Amid all of the chaos surrounding Elon Musk's bid to buy Twitter, I can't help but wonder what Twitter will look like when the dust settles and we find out who takes over or remains in control.

And while we can't quite predict what the wildly popular social networking app would look like if Musk successfully buys the company and takes it private, I do know what changes I'd like to see happen regardless of who ends up in charge of that terrible, amazing bird app.
An edit button

Read more