Friends

Friends are the people you’ve connected with on Pentos. Friends can always see each other’s full profile, including bio, location, status and friends list. They’re listed in the Friends tab when you share something, and first when you search for someone to message. When you type @ in a message, the people suggested are your friends. See Mentions.

You don’t need to be friends to message someone. See Conversations.

Your Friends Tab

Your friends and friend requests are on the Friends tab of your profile in Collab, to the right of your profile card. Beside it are Team, greyed out (“Coming soon”), and Preferences, with your Public profile setting and the people you’ve blocked. To get there:

Your profile: open it from the user menu or the Collab sidebar. See Viewing Your Profile.
Notifications: every friend notification opens your profile, whether you click Open on the pop-up, click it under All or Social in Collab Updates, or click it in Updates in the top bar.

Your Friends tab marks your friend notifications as read while it’s open.

At the top of the tab is a search box. With nothing typed in it, the tab lists:

Friend requests: requests sent to you, newest first, with how many are waiting, shown only when you have some. See Answering Friend Requests.
Friends: your friends, with how many you have. See Your Friends.

Typing in the search box looks for anyone on Pentos instead. See Adding a Friend.

Every person on a Friends tab, whether a friend, a request, a search result or someone on another person’s list, has the same buttons for where you stand with them:

Not friends: the add icon (Add friend) sends a friend request.
Request sent: a clock (Cancel request). Click it to cancel your request.
They asked you: Decline and Accept.
Friends: the message icon (Message) opens your direct message with them, or starts one.

After those, More (the three dots) has View (opens their profile), Unfriend (friends only) and Block. Unfriend and Block ask you to confirm first. More shows when you hover over a row or reach it with the keyboard, and is always shown on a touch screen. The buttons other than More appear once your friends and requests have loaded, so they always match where you stand. A button changes as soon as you click it. If Pentos can’t complete the action, you’ll see an error and the button goes back to how it was.

Click someone’s name to open their profile. Back on their profile returns you to yours.

Adding a Friend

Open your profile. The Friends tab is to the right of your profile card.
In the search box, type at least 2 characters of the person’s name or @username, or their full email address.
Click the add icon (Add friend) next to the person. To see who they are first, click their name to open their profile.

Search finds anyone on Pentos by name, @username or full email address, except someone blocked by either of you. An @ at the start is ignored, so “@maya” finds the username maya. Someone whose username you typed exactly comes first, then your friends, then people who share the most friends with you, then everyone else. Each result shows the person’s @username, then Friends or, if you share any, how many friends you share, such as “3 mutual friends”. More results load as you scroll down, up to 100, so if you don’t see the person, type more of their name. If nobody matches, you’ll see “No one matches” with a hint to check the spelling or try their @username.

You can also click the add icon (Add friend) under someone’s photo, on their profile or in the User Profile panel. It then turns into a clock (Cancel request). In a group’s Group Info, a channel’s Channel Info, a chat’s Chat Info or a file or folder’s Info sidebar, the add icon (Add friend) next to a member sends a request too.

The other person gets a New Friend Request notification: a pop-up with Open, and an entry under Social in Collab Updates. Until they answer, their row on any Friends tab shows a clock (Cancel request). If they’ve already sent you a request, adding them accepts it and you become friends.

Answering Friend Requests

Requests sent to you are under Friend requests on your Friends tab, newest first. Each shows how many friends you share, or the person’s @username if you share none, and how long ago they asked, such as “3 mutual friends · 2d ago”. Click their name to open their profile. Next to each request:

Accept: you become friends, and they get a Friend Request Accepted notification. The request stays where it is, reading “You’re now friends”, until you leave your Friends tab, unless you unfriend or block them first.
Decline: removes the request. They aren’t notified, though the decline appears in their Logs, and they can send you a new request later.
Block: under More (the three dots). See Blocking a User.

You can also answer under their photo, on their profile or in the User Profile panel: click Respond and choose Accept or Decline.

Cancelling a Sent Request

There’s no list of the requests you’ve sent. To cancel one, search for the person on your Friends tab and click the clock (Cancel request) next to them. You can also click the clock (Cancel request) under their photo, on their profile or in the User Profile panel. The request is withdrawn without notifying them, though the New Friend Request notification they already got stays in their notifications. You can send a new request later.

Your Friends

Under Friends on your Friends tab, each friend shows their @username and “Friends”. Click a friend’s name to open their profile, or click the message icon (Message) to open your direct message with them, or start one. More (the three dots) has View, Unfriend and Block.

Viewing Someone Else’s Friends

On another person’s profile, their friends are on the Friends tab, to the right of their profile card. The card shows up to 3 of their friends’ photos, with how many friends they have and how many you share. In the User Profile panel, click their friends to open their profile. You’re listed first if you’re friends, as You, then the friends you have in common, marked Mutual friend, then everyone else. Type in the search box to filter the list by name or username. Click anyone else’s name to open their profile. Everyone but you has the same buttons as on your own Friends tab. Anyone you’ve blocked, or who has blocked you, is left out. If the list can’t load, you’ll see an error with Try again.

Someone’s friends list is shown only to their friends, unless they’ve made their profile public. If it isn’t shown to you, their card still shows their counts, without photos, and their profile says “{name}‘s profile is private” in place of the tabs.

Removing a Friend

From a Friends tab: click More (the three dots) next to them, then Unfriend.
From their profile or User Profile panel: click Friends under their photo, then Unfriend.

Click Remove friend to confirm. They aren’t notified: their friends list just updates. The removal shows in both of your Logs. If you were on their profile, you stay there, and it now offers Add friend. Conversations between you aren’t affected, and either of you can send a new friend request later. Unless your profile is public, they can no longer see your bio, location, status or friends list.

Blocking a User

On a Friends tab, click More (the three dots) next to the person, then Block. Or open their profile, click More (the three dots at the top right of the cover), then Block. Click Block user to confirm. They aren’t notified, and the block is recorded in the Security tab of your Logs. If Pentos can’t unshare everything between you, the block doesn’t go through and nothing changes, so you can try again.

What Blocking Does

Friendship and requests: any friendship or pending request between you ends, and neither of you can send the other a friend request.
Search: you stop appearing in each other’s search results, and nothing one of you wrote or owns, such as messages, files and comments, turns up when the other searches, even in groups, channels and chats someone else shared with you both.
Shared items: chats, files and folders either of you shared with the other are unshared, in both directions, and disappear from both of your Shared views straight away. Other things you’ve shared with each other, such as tasks and projects, stay shared.
New direct messages: neither of you can start a new direct message with the other.
Existing direct message: it’s hidden from both of you everywhere, including search and Files, and neither of you can open, send in, react in, call from, leave or download files from it. Its history is kept, and it comes back if the block is lifted.
Notifications: notifications either of you got from the other, such as messages, mentions, reactions and friend requests, are cleared, and they don’t come back if the block is lifted.
Groups, channels and shared chats: blocking doesn’t remove either of you from groups or channels you share, or from chats someone else shared with you both, and you’ll still see each other’s names, photos and messages there. Neither of you is notified about the other’s messages, replies, @mentions, reactions, comment replies, task updates or calls. Files one of you attaches in a group or channel don’t appear in the other’s Shared view, though they can still open them there. Neither of you can add the other to a group, channel or task, and @mentioning the other in a task doesn’t give them access to it.
Sharing again: neither of you can share chats, files or folders with the other, and nobody can share something one of you owns with the other.
Profiles: wherever they open your profile, including from a group or channel you share, it says “This profile isn’t available”, without your name or picture and with no way to add, message or block you. Theirs shows you “You blocked {name}” with an Unblock button. Neither of you appears in the other’s view of anyone’s friends list.

Unblocking a User

On your profile, open the Preferences tab.
Under Blocked, click the unblock icon (Unblock) next to the person. Or click their name to open their profile, then click Unblock there.

Blocked lists everyone you’ve blocked, with their @username, and says “You haven’t blocked anyone.” when there’s no one. Someone you unblock leaves the list straight away; if Pentos can’t complete it, you’ll see an error and they come back. If the list can’t load, you’ll see an error with Try again. Only the person who placed the block can remove it, and blocking back doesn’t change that: if you’ve blocked someone and they block you too, your block stays on your Blocked list and only you can lift it.

Once neither of you has a block in place, your direct message comes back for both of you, with its history, and you show up in each other’s search results again. Unblocking doesn’t bring back your friendship, anything that was unshared or the notifications that were cleared: send a new friend request and share again if you need to.

Friends in Your Logs

Friend requests (sent, received, accepted, declined or cancelled) and removed friendships appear under Activity in Logs. Blocks and unblocks appear under Security, and only in your own log.