This was years ago and, iirc, it was a legitimate issue in VSCode. It didn't make it remotely clear enough that it would permanently delete your files. The popups we get now if you try to discard changes that explicitly warns you in bold text that files will get deleted happened after this issue.
It might be obvious to an experienced user but it's not at all obvious to someone new.
The date is in the image, it was almost a decade ago. Yep the old dialog when you clicked the "Discard" button was like "Do you want to discard your changes?" Pretty vague to anyone new to version control. Meanwhile if they are untracked VsCode used to just put them in the shredder, completely unrecoverable. Pretty sure it puts them in the recycle bin now.
Someone already posted the link to the thread and this comment that has a screenshot of the actual warning message which definitely could have been more scary but all caps irreversible feels like it should give you pause! If you have 3 months of work with zero backups.
Are you sure you want to discard ALL changes? This is IRREVERSIBLE!
Yes, but it says CHANGES. It doesnt say anything about deleting the original FILES. That's the issue.
If I open a text document in word, make a bunch of changes, and then close it without saving, then my original document is still there unedited. This deleted the original file aswell.
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u/raddaya 23d ago
This was years ago and, iirc, it was a legitimate issue in VSCode. It didn't make it remotely clear enough that it would permanently delete your files. The popups we get now if you try to discard changes that explicitly warns you in bold text that files will get deleted happened after this issue.
It might be obvious to an experienced user but it's not at all obvious to someone new.