Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL • Hacker News Board

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#271

Post by md_ » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 7:55 PM UTC

peterwwillis wrote: post #226

ehsankia wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn't care so far because it was so confusing. The hope is that by showing something that's user-relevant (the name of the website name and the security level), it will become more useful for the average user. Why should a user see: https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada?utm=asdioasd&arg=j210d... when all they care about is "Wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada"?

What if the user sees "Wik1pedia.org/wiki/Canada"? Or "аррӏе.com"? Hiding random parts of the address isn't going to make browsing the web better. The main purpose of URLs is for hyperlinks, not as a highly intuitive user interface. Users who don't know how URLs work don't care what is up there. They only care that what they are looking at is what they expect, and a way to get to where they want to go. And that's a c…

Don’t Firefox and Safari also have a single bar for searches?

Yet neither company runs a search engine. I don’t suppose it’s possible this is just better for most users?

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#272

Post by jdeibele » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 7:58 PM UTC

ggggtez wrote: post #154

asimpletune wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this is weird. Which users are bothered enough by the leading www enough to justify messing with semantics?

I'm guessing it's related to mobile. Limited real estate means removing www gives you 3 more characters on the end of the url.

Pendantic hat on: 4 www.

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#273

Post by komali2 » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 7:58 PM UTC

theandrewbailey wrote: post #48

It begins. I saw this this morning, and thought it was something that was coming in the next few versions, not right now . https://www.wired.com/story/google-wants-to-kill-the-url/ WTF? People get angry when you just move their cheese without notice.

>People get angry when you just move their cheese without notice.

Sorry, unrelated, but ahah, what is this saying? I love it and have never heard it before. I guess it's from some sort of book? https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/cheese-moving-effecting-change-ra...

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#274

Post by md_ » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

freehunter wrote: post #217

ehsankia wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn't care so far because it was so confusing. The hope is that by showing something that's user-relevant (the name of the website name and the security level), it will become more useful for the average user. Why should a user see: https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada?utm=asdioasd&arg=j210d... when all they care about is "Wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada"?

Because arguments aren't always useless like in your example. Might as well just do away with the whole URL bar and just have a green checkmark if Chrome thinks it's the site you want. I mean, why should a user see "Wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada" when all they care about is "This is the Wikipedia Page for Canada"?

I know you’re being sarcastic, but if chrome could, with perfect accuracy, indicate if this was “the site you want”, why not do away with the url?

Mind you, I’m not suggesting to do away with linking, as some rando suggested this implies. (While chrome doesn’t show the protocol prefix, it still copies the prefix when you copy the url, so imagine a similar ui.) But for most users, wouldn’t a ui that shows “server identity” in some more user-coherent way be what they want?

In particular, do subdomains help or hurt phishing detection?

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#275

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

trocadero wrote: post #173

parliament32 wrote: post #118

Considering a subdomain "trivial" is ridiculous... there's a difference between "www.example.com" and "example.com". Not only can they serve different sites, they can even have different DNS records! It seems that "m." is also considered a trivial subdomain. So when a user clicks a link to a "m.facebook.com" uri, they'll be confused why FB looks different when the browser reports it's on "facebook.com". I sincerely h…

>there's a difference between "www.example.com" and "example.com" Can you link to a site where these two are different?

[deleted]

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#276

Post by cestith » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 8:00 PM UTC

ihuman wrote: post #10

Is this really a big deal? Don't many websites either redirect the www to the non-www, or the other way around?

Is it really a big deal if customers shoplift? Many are still paying.

Is it really a big deal if you serve the wrong content 1% of the time?

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#277

Post by type0 » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 8:00 PM UTC

idbehold wrote: post #265

fireattack wrote: post #99

I'm ok with hiding "www.", but it also hides "m." which is sometimes very confusing (I once opened a m.facebook.com link and was very puzzled why it uses the mobile site when the URl bar just shows "facebook.com").

What you may be surprised to learn is that Chrome isn't just stripping "www." from the beginning of the subdomain. "subdomain.www.domain.com" displays as "subdomain.domain.com"

This is amazing, what a freak show.

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#278

Post by Already__Taken » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 8:02 PM UTC

soared wrote: post #61

Klonoar wrote: post #12

Yo, this is... going too far, c'mon now. While sure, www seems odd now, it's still a subdomain and we're inching into territory of obscuring things that matter for small gains in end-user perception that aren't _that_ impactful.

Why does www matter?

Currently have a test domain for junk. example.com is broken but www.example.com works fine.

I come across enough sites were one or the other is broken I'd call it important.

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#279

Post by jasonlotito » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 8:02 PM UTC

nbrempel wrote: post #66

Safari has been doing this for some time. The "trivial subdomain" will show when you click the url bar, however.

Chrome doesn't show on click. You have to double click. Safari also shows the URL when you use the Keyboard shortcut CMD+L, Chrome does not.

Re: Chrome 69: “www.” subdomain missing from URL

#280

Post by jklinger410 » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 8:03 PM UTC

You know, as much as I'm all for considering www a trivial subdomain, this should have had much more public discussion before implementing it into the most used browser in the world.