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Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

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Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#41

Post by defen »

iqster wrote: post #30

What I find really shocking is how the UX of the main google search page has deteriorated for me. It gives me all sorts of crap that doesn't make any sense ... and I don't even know how to complain since all the content is personalized to me (e.g. photographs). Google's search page used to be an Internet treasure ... for me, it is now another example of how the quest for revenue growth destroys beautiful products.

Not just confusing...also buggy. I would say that about 1% of the time Google Instant just totally fails for me - I type a word or phrase and hit enter, and I just get an empty white box where the search results should be. To fix it I have to manually click the blue search icon.

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#42

Post by tubes »

untog wrote: post #39
ianox wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of the '+' was annoying to me at first. I don't seem to miss it anymore though, but then I do use the keyboard a lot for opening up new tabs.

We all know Chrome very well, though. If you launched it for the first time it's very unclear what that button does- and given that the only thing it does do is open a tab, why remove the +?

I think in a couple of months there will be a "+1" button at the top bar of Chrome so you can click it to "like" any page.. And having a "+" button next to it would've been confusing.

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#43

Post by psweber »

tubes wrote: post #42
untog wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We all know Chrome very well, though. If you launched it for the first time it's very unclear what that button does- and given that the only thing it does do is open a tab, why remove the +?

I think in a couple of months there will be a "+1" button at the top bar of Chrome so you can click it to "like" any page.. And having a "+" button next to it would've been confusing.

Mind blown. Also, I hate that you might be right.

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#44

Post by lurker17 »

kibwen wrote: post #24
shingen wrote: post #15

He's spot on. The removal of the plus to create a new tab in Chrome is bad design, period. I hadn't noticed the lack of the logo link until someone else pointed it out. Why would anyone reduce ease of navigation, particularly from an object that is going to be there anyway? I use Gmail as my main email application, and have since they first launched it. They've started to annoy me with the interface changes. I think…

After the full roll-out of Gmail's new UI, which was seemingly obligatory, my UI reverted to the old interface within a week. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I opted-in to the new UI when it was still in beta, and then opted out after quickly becoming dissatisfied with it (I just really can't get over how laggy the mouseover animations are). In any case, I've noticed that my Gmail querystring looks…

Doesn't work for me :-(

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#45

Post by lurker17 »

danabramov wrote: post #40

I like the plus label removed. For someone who never ever used a tabbed browser, “+” doesn't mean “new tab”. It doesn't even mean ”add a thing“. It means “sum”. Web browser is the most basic application to use this icon. The icon just doesn't help because user has no prior knowledge of the metaphor anyway.

+1

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#46

Post by rufibarbatus »

lurker17 wrote: post #44
kibwen wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After the full roll-out of Gmail's new UI, which was seemingly obligatory, my UI reverted to the old interface within a week. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I opted-in to the new UI when it was still in beta, and then opted out after quickly becoming dissatisfied with it (I just really can't get over how laggy the mouseover animations are). In any case, I've noticed that my Gmail querystring looks…

Doesn't work for me :-(

Nor to me. Interestingly, using http://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1 redirects to http://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2 !

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#47

Post by australis »

mattmanser wrote: post #26
citricsquid wrote: post #6

> First up is the 'new tab' chicklet in the Chrome tab bar. Somewhere around Chrome 16 the '+' disappeared from it, leaving a little ghost of a button that, to my mind, wouldn't be recognized for what it was by a user who hadn't already formed their mental model on earlier versions of Chrome. I'd noticed this and it was very irritating! I assumed it was a bug and for whatever reason the image was missing, not that th…

The weird thing for me was without the + the clickable area seemed much smaller and I felt it was fiddly. But I happened to have my laptop and desktop open when the change happened and it's exactly the same size.

The clickable area may seem smaller, but the hit box for the button is actually larger than the graphic for the button (presumably to avoid the fiddly issue you were highlighting)

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#48

Post by cdcox »

guynamedloren wrote: post #5

I'm most confused about Google's decision to remove the links from the logos. This is a convention engrained in the interwebs and I can't come up with a single reason why they would change it. Sure maybe inexperienced users wouldn't know the functionality exists, but when has that ever been a reason to remove a feature? I think there was a HN discussion about this recently, but I missed it. Anybody know why they made…

I can think of three okay reasons:

1. They are planning to get rid of it. Google has way too many non-removable elements as is, even using so called compact mode. Right now they have two or three bars that could be smashed together with a few modifications. This is doubly true if they get rid of a giant useless logo that stalks you throughout your pages.

2. People were clicking it by accident. As a heavy net user, I don't feel this, but perhaps older or tablet users (but then why not fix it for them) were clicking it and pulling themselves out of Gmail. I could see this being extremely frustrating for a user trying to click the mail or search button.

3. They wanted to shift the functionality to the black bar. This is sort of a combination of the above two. The Google logo is pretty ambiguous. When I click it do I want to reload the page? Do I want to go to the Google homepage? Do I want iGoogle (why did they ruin Reader temporarily but not fix the mess that is iGoogle)? Do I want to search with the bar next to the logo? This is compounded by the fact that it has a context based search bar next to it. I know what that bar does but the context search UI is pretty ambiguous for a first time user.

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#49

Post by sopooneo »

tubes wrote: post #42
untog wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We all know Chrome very well, though. If you launched it for the first time it's very unclear what that button does- and given that the only thing it does do is open a tab, why remove the +?

I think in a couple of months there will be a "+1" button at the top bar of Chrome so you can click it to "like" any page.. And having a "+" button next to it would've been confusing.

Not since the end of The Usual Suspects...

Re: Kevin Fox on recent Google UX changes: from strange-to-me to just-plain-crazy

#50

Post by ianox »

untog wrote: post #39
ianox wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of the '+' was annoying to me at first. I don't seem to miss it anymore though, but then I do use the keyboard a lot for opening up new tabs.

We all know Chrome very well, though. If you launched it for the first time it's very unclear what that button does- and given that the only thing it does do is open a tab, why remove the +?

Yes, good point - I can't think of any reason, let alone a good reason, to remove the '+'. Fortunately, when using the keyboard, Ctrl+T or Cmd+T tends to work the same cross-browser.
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