Do not use them for local action results
Aliases: local result · global misuse · action receipt
What it is
Sending “this row was deleted,” “comment published,” or “filter applied” through the global slot reports a local result as if it were application state. Readers of a global notice ask “what is the product doing now”; the right answer for a local result is “what happened to the object you just touched.” The wrong channel inflates a small success into a situation, or a small failure into a broken system. This leaf is about what must not enter the global channel, not about whether that channel itself should persist.
Why it happens
The global slot is read as a world model: appearance means the environment changed, disappearance means it recovered. A local result is an event whose life is that one action. An event in an environment channel makes people carry “that thing is still in effect” onto every later page—a “comment published” strip still hanging over Settings is taken to mean Settings just published a comment. Conversely, a real environment change dressed as an action receipt is glanced at and left behind, never taken as a constraint on the next move. Placement leaks ownership too: the global bar is far from the row in a table, and space already says “this is not about that row.” People grade messages by channel identity; the wrong channel is the wrong grade.
Where it stops holding
If a local action changes what the whole app can do (revoking the last admin, deleting the current workspace), the result has already been promoted to global state, belongs on the global channel, and must say from when and for whom. A bulk-action summary looks global, but it still belongs to “this set of objects” and should sit by the list or the selection bar, not the top bar. In a multi-window product, a save in window A must not appear in window B’s global slot, even if they share a process. A log or audit stream whose content is events is not misuse of the global channel; it is a different surface.
Applying it
- Before writing a message, ask whether it stays true if the object and the page both change. If not, it does not belong in the global slot.
- Keep object-level success and failure beside the object or the trigger; keep page-level results on that page; promote only environment-level constraints.
- Audit copy currently in the global slot and remove completed-tense “did …” receipts; put those next to the object.
- Verify by finishing a local action and immediately opening an unrelated page. If the success or failure is still showing, the channel is already lying.