I currently think there is no way (or at least no easy way) to transfer message history to a new laptop. So at some point, I will have lost all message history.
For moving message history from desktop to desktop, there is no official way yet endorsed by Signal developers. But there are unofficial ways (that I have yet to test myself, and would be great to test! Please let us know if you tried this method either successfully or unsuccessfully.)
What I need is a way to transfer message history from mobile to desktop, which I haven’t found any instructions for (the most usual way for me to lose access to my desktop message history is for my laptop to break, so transferring between different devices isn’t super helpful).
I’m looking into (informal) ways to transfer message history from mobile to desktop, and will get back to you. (It would be great to have a Signal expert/enthusiast on board for these kinds of questions!)
The solution that I’m pretty convinced would work is to periodically backup the desktop Signal files on a secure cloud storage. But again, I haven’t tried this.
If it’s easy and doable in less 5 minutes without risking your message history somehow, that would address a major problem for me. I do also think the absence of this feature indicates to me that Signal just doesn’t really care about the user experience of people in my reference class, so I expect to find many similar problems, which makes me very hesitant to switch over, while obvious things like this haven’t been addressed (it seems kind of obvious to me that message history should just be able to be automatically synced across all devices, and this should totally be cryptographically possible).
I currently think there is no way (or at least no easy way) to transfer message history to a new laptop. So at some point, I will have lost all message history.
Thanks so much, Habryka, for this really important point! I really appreciate it.
How to move message history between devices?
For moving message history from your primary (mobile) device to your new primary device: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059752-Backup-and-Restore-Messages
For moving message history from desktop to desktop, there is no official way yet endorsed by Signal developers. But there are unofficial ways (that I have yet to test myself, and would be great to test! Please let us know if you tried this method either successfully or unsuccessfully.)
Moving chat history from Windows to Windows: https://www.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/s93756/is_there_way_i_can_move_over_my_chat_history_from/htllhog/?context=8&depth=9
Moving chat history from Mac to Mac: https://www.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/lbnzg7/comment/hifd8tj/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
Again, I have not tried these methods. It would be great if someone has tried them and shared the result with the rest of the EA community!
What I need is a way to transfer message history from mobile to desktop, which I haven’t found any instructions for (the most usual way for me to lose access to my desktop message history is for my laptop to break, so transferring between different devices isn’t super helpful).
element can get you both e2e encryption and transfer between devices.
I’m looking into (informal) ways to transfer message history from mobile to desktop, and will get back to you. (It would be great to have a Signal expert/enthusiast on board for these kinds of questions!)
The solution that I’m pretty convinced would work is to periodically backup the desktop Signal files on a secure cloud storage. But again, I haven’t tried this.
@Habryka, if this were solved, would you change your mind?
If it’s easy and doable in less 5 minutes without risking your message history somehow, that would address a major problem for me. I do also think the absence of this feature indicates to me that Signal just doesn’t really care about the user experience of people in my reference class, so I expect to find many similar problems, which makes me very hesitant to switch over, while obvious things like this haven’t been addressed (it seems kind of obvious to me that message history should just be able to be automatically synced across all devices, and this should totally be cryptographically possible).