Problems with the Keyboard Shortcuts in the Editor

đź’¬ App Building
1

Hi, hope this is the right category to post in.

I have an issue in the editor, and lately is has gotten worse, and the problem is that while writing text in any input, it looses focus (because of the code suggestions probably, not sure) .

The problem when the input field looses focus is that if I am using the key Backspace, it will start deleting things. Or if I am using Ctrl+Z to undo my last changes in the text I am writing, I am suddenly undoing the entire Query loosing code I have spent hours to polish!!

So I am requesting to disable Retool Keyboard shortcuts as they are proving the be extremely dangerous to me. I have already lost pieces of code and I am simply afraid of even writing text in the inputs.

Please also fix the inputs loosing focus. Not sure what triggers it, but it happens very very often.

3

Disable Auto-run Queries

Auto-running queries causes re-renders → input loses focus.

How to disable:

  • Go to each query → Settings (:gear: icon)

  • Turn off “Run query automatically when inputs change”

  • Set to Manual run

This helps stabilize the editor.

Use “Undo Protection”: Duplicate Before Editing

Before editing a complex query:

  1. Right-click query → Duplicate

  2. Rename duplicate as backup

  3. Edit only the active one

This way Ctrl+Z issues or component deletions won’t destroy your only version.

5

Thank you for you answer but you oversimplified the problem. For example just a minute ago I wanted to change the name of a Query, and I confidently hit backspace 6 times because that’s the length of the word I was deleting, and I was seeing something was out of the ordinary but until my brain processed the problem, the finger already executed its task, omg, and I was seeing a message saying that multiple Queries were deleted and that now I have to manually delete a long list of queries related to them, no confirmation, no safety, pure crap!
So I use Undo, which sounds like a nice feature, but it is actually broken, because it does not restore the app correctly, many things are moved in other folders, another pure crap!

I take a backup every few hours, but I simply fail to understand why something that can damage my app is so easily accessible without a confirmation, or some sort of protection.
Deletion and Undo should not easily available specially if the Redo operation is broken, but even if it was working perfectly it is still a shitty thing to be able to loose data so easily.

I mean the UI should not do things like leaving a Query fully blank when I hit run on another Query that has a relation to it. Or when I load the UI some Queries are missing, or when I change from one SQL Query to another it changes from SQL to GUI and the SQL is completely removed.
The point is: there are so many ways of loosing data because of a broken UI, why put tools to make it easier to loose data?!?!

Please let me disable the keyboard shortcuts, why should I be afraid of using my keyboard?!? I don’t have the mental energy to go forward when every key I hit can be disastrous!!

And all my Queries are on manual except one that runs on page load, and the UI is still very much unstable!! The UI has so many errors that it just blows my mind to think of a stable UI here at Retool. Sorry if it is too harsh but I feel terribly disappointed of having to be extremely cautions on every key I hit on the god damn UI because of the Keyboard Shortcuts

6

Hey Cristian, sorry that you are running into this. It sounds like it’s not shortcut per-se, just a delete/backspace that’s unexpectingly deleting the queries :disappointed_face:. I’ve ran into this previously as well, but it was either my tab/ backspace/esc key was stuck, I forgot. That was just my case, probably won’t help with general performance or editing experience.

7

Could you share your browser version so we can try to replicate?

8

If you happen to be on Edge on PC or Safari on Mac, you need to disable some power saving to make Retool run faster, or switch to Chrome with energy saver mode disabled

9

Hi @retoolin

I use Firefox v145.0.2 (64 bytes) on Windows 11, high-end hardware.

The UI clogs for a split second every time I focus a new text input (in Query code, names, or events). To prevent UI errors or data loss, I must type extremely slowly (one key at a time), which is exhausting.

The issue first appeared around 150+ queries and has worsened significantly, pointing to the code suggestion/highlighting features loading as the source.

I request options to disable automatic code suggestions, default Retool keyboard shortcuts, and the synchronization of Query/Variable names across the application to improve editor performance.