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What if there was Undo History specific to each layer in addition to the standard global undo. Does anyone know if this exists already? Currently for pretty much every program in the world "CTRL + Z" is the hotkey for "undo last modification/action", but what if GIMP, or some 3rd party developer, made it possible for each layer in GIMP to log its own independent history? I am far from a programmer, but is it feasible to make an addition to GIMP that allows users to click on a layer and only undo the history of changes made to the specified layer?
Keep global undo "CTRL + Z", but add in a modifier for layer specific undo like a "CTRL + ALT + Z"

Would be pretty dope. 

Example: I'm sure you get it already, but every so often I will have made changes to a layer, moved onto another layer, then wanted to undo some changes I applied to the previous layer, but Undo isn't layer specific, it can only go backwards chronologically, so I'll have to erase the work I want to keep on the layer I have been working on in order to undo the work I've done on a previous layer. 

*of course in this case, in reality, I will not use Undo, I will delete the layer I want to reset so I can keep the work I did after making changes to this previous layer. But, also that sucks. would love something like an Advanced Undo.
This isn't implemented as "undo", but as "non-destructive editing". Basically your initial data is kept around untouched, and the application records the actions and can replay them, so you can remove/alter an action in the flow without having to redo everything. Thinks about coming up with a special effect on text that involves a bunch of operations: selections, blend-fill, etc... and being able to change the source text and see the new transformed text in real time.

This exists in Photoshop, but in Gimp this is planned for Gimp 3.2.... so don't hold your breath.
It could have been even better...

There is a "Selective Undo" out there, where you go to your history and select the specific step you want to remove, this will not affect other steps even if they were made after the step you want to remove.
They did their tries on a software based on Pixelitor (FLOSS), it's called Aquamarine, I was never able to get/find Aquamarine or put my hand on it (the word "aquamarine" is already a stonewall as it's way too spreaded for other things), I do have 2 Pixelitor version, though (it's a little gem)

Quick examples and references:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EmbGg-b6Mo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUHnZudq7ws
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j433xo7CcRU

"Selective Undo" in deep at a conference/presentation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwKNZthSkBI

Some articles
https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Us...a4d92f58a8
https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~NatProg/aquamarine.html

The sad part... it started around 2012?-2015, but I don't have recent news about Aquamarine/Selective Undo, may be a company bought it, Or Adobe has some rights on it, or it just got forgotten.