Hmm, what's the history limit? After having Joplin open for a few days, the back history will be in the hundreds/thousands.

What should happen to the sidebar? Should the notebook the note was in expanded? Wouldn't we need a forward button as well? (when moving away from the note the folders have to be collapsed, otherwise you'll end up with a huge tree.)
Sorry for all these questions, but for a good firat issue the specs should be clearer.

Would you also want a "forward" button?

It depends. I just think that the specs need an overhaul. As mentioned in my previous comment, there are a few items that are not clear. e.g. we can't just let the history keep growing ad infinitum....

@tessus, I think that if there was a forward and backward button, the history limit should only exist during a session and then be cleared once the user is done and has exited the app. That's how buffers work in Vim. Of course, maybe add the option to save a possible note group that opens automatically if the user needs to frequently edit specific notes.

Just spitballing ideas here. I hope these make sense.

Would you also want a "forward" button?

That would indeed make sense and would probably be expected by users.

The history should indeed be in memory and not persisted to disk.

Would this fully replace the current implementation when going between linked notes to include when the user opens multiple notes in a row or be an extension of that?

Good idea! Not only a button, but additionally shortcuts would be nice, like ALT+left and ALT+right.

See also feature request #716

For shortcuts, let's keep that for a separate issue as this one is a "good first issue" so it needs to be kept relatively simple.

Would this fully replace the current implementation when going between linked notes to include when the user opens multiple notes in a row or be an extension of that?

Yes, I would thought that was implied? Like there wouldn't be two back buttons - one for the linked note handling, and one for regular navigation, it's just one back button, which handles both behaviours. If the description needs to be clarified please let me know what should be changed.

the history limit should only exist during a session and then be cleared once the user is done and has exited the app

This is exactly my point. I start the app and it runs until a new update is available. Thus usually a few weeks. So if you created a history worth a few weeks it would be a total overkill and memory hog. This is why I mentioned a limit on the history. Pick a number or a timeframe and use a FIFO queue.

When it comes to persistence I think this is debatable. I really hate it when I restart the app that all notes that were selected in the different folders and their positions are gone.

Is it possible to access that history in the menu, like for instance the list of the last used documents in Libre Office?

I know this is gonna extend the feature, but think of that possibility, before implementing the back button.