Live data from Hacker News

Introducing the new compose in Gmail

gmailblog.blogspot.co.uk

131–140 of 202 posts

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#131

I hate being the guy who sidetracks a thread off the bat by complaining about something unrelated, but... Whatever blogspot theme Google uses for this blog is just god awful (oh, I see, this is it: http://gmailblog.blogspot.co.uk/p/as-you-may-have-noticed-gm... ), and I swear it gets worse every time I view a post there. To wit: When I load the page I see the orange "loading" gears. Then that sliiiiides up to reveal…

Fails to work w/o javascript enabled as well. Fail Google.

[deleted]

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#132

I hate being the guy who sidetracks a thread off the bat by complaining about something unrelated, but... Whatever blogspot theme Google uses for this blog is just god awful (oh, I see, this is it: http://gmailblog.blogspot.co.uk/p/as-you-may-have-noticed-gm... ), and I swear it gets worse every time I view a post there. To wit: When I load the page I see the orange "loading" gears. Then that sliiiiides up to reveal…

Ugh, why would anyone up-vote this comment? Some how this is the top comment, even though it doesn't address the content of the article. This happens all the time on HN and I find it very annoying. It's not just that I don't want to scroll past this comment. These meta-comments may seem harmless, but when this is the top comment, it stifles the entire discussion about the article. Instead of people discussing the mer…

Agreed, these ux complaints are getting annoying.

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#133
post #32

Saving a draft, opening the old email, and then reopening your draft wastes valuable minutes. The new compose pops up in a window, just like chats (only larger). Minutes? I do sometimes wonder where the day goes... Alternatively, Shift-click on compose (or press capital C to with keyboard shortcuts on), and you'll get an actual window that you can move and resize. With the chat mini-windows I frequently wish that I c…

You can make a chat a separate window that is adjustable if you want. Just click on the pop out (arrow going up and to the right) button on the upper right of any chat window.

After watching my Mom use the computer, I understand why Google doesn't create a new window my default. She can't switch between windows in her normal workflow (she can't remember where they went or the keyboard shortcuts to switch between windows). It's not as if she's new to computers - she has been using a PC since the 80s when she used Autocad to draft. She just doesn't really understand how to use multiple windows in a workflow and doesn't want to remember keyboard shortcuts.

I think is an important rule in design - are you building something you can use, or something that your mom can? More people are in the latter camp, and if you can design something simple enough for your mom, it probably is useable by people like you.

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#134

I hate being the guy who sidetracks a thread off the bat by complaining about something unrelated, but... Whatever blogspot theme Google uses for this blog is just god awful (oh, I see, this is it: http://gmailblog.blogspot.co.uk/p/as-you-may-have-noticed-gm... ), and I swear it gets worse every time I view a post there. To wit: When I load the page I see the orange "loading" gears. Then that sliiiiides up to reveal…

I was about to come on here and post this same thing.

The worst part is the font. Almost unreadable using Chrome/Win7 (Their own browser!).

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#135

I hate being the guy who sidetracks a thread off the bat by complaining about something unrelated, but... Whatever blogspot theme Google uses for this blog is just god awful (oh, I see, this is it: http://gmailblog.blogspot.co.uk/p/as-you-may-have-noticed-gm... ), and I swear it gets worse every time I view a post there. To wit: When I load the page I see the orange "loading" gears. Then that sliiiiides up to reveal…

Ugh, why would anyone up-vote this comment? Some how this is the top comment, even though it doesn't address the content of the article. This happens all the time on HN and I find it very annoying. It's not just that I don't want to scroll past this comment. These meta-comments may seem harmless, but when this is the top comment, it stifles the entire discussion about the article. Instead of people discussing the mer…

Normally I'd agree but I came in here to post this same thing as the page is almost unreadable for me in Chrome.

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#136
Good. I wonder if this also addresses the problem when you are replying to a long chain of email conversation, the compose box includes the entire chain while also displaying the chain above the compose box. Very unpleasant.

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#137

I hate being the guy who sidetracks a thread off the bat by complaining about something unrelated, but... Whatever blogspot theme Google uses for this blog is just god awful (oh, I see, this is it: http://gmailblog.blogspot.co.uk/p/as-you-may-have-noticed-gm... ), and I swear it gets worse every time I view a post there. To wit: When I load the page I see the orange "loading" gears. Then that sliiiiides up to reveal…

Ugh, why would anyone up-vote this comment? Some how this is the top comment, even though it doesn't address the content of the article. This happens all the time on HN and I find it very annoying. It's not just that I don't want to scroll past this comment. These meta-comments may seem harmless, but when this is the top comment, it stifles the entire discussion about the article. Instead of people discussing the mer…

I found your meta-meta comment more useless, better to just let it be. OTOH this meta-meta-meta comment is fantastic, especially this sentence.

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#138
post #102
post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Advancing? Most 'scripting is taking a pound of flesh from the user experience, in return for little to no actual gain.

scripting? I have no idea what you're referring to, but using a browser capable of rendering the web properly is a requirement these days. That's why they have mostly gone to an automatic update model, the web is fluid and changes rapidly, to keep up you need to be running a modern browser.

massklin is not complaining he can't use an old browser to navigate a 3D maze of blog posts jurassicpark style.

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#139

And ... addressing the content of this blog post: yet another reason mutt wins as a mail client. Open mutt (preferably under screen so you can 'C-a "' between mail folders), view message(s) you want to reference (optionally: tag relevant messages, using mutt's filtering tools as necessary, than 'l ~T' to restrict to just the tagged messages, allowing you to rapidly reference a set of messages. Fire up a new terminal…

That sounds completely doable for 99% of internet users! Surprised my grandma hasn't already been using this exact workflow.

Re: Introducing the new compose in Gmail

#140
post #52

facepalm All of the pain points that this supposedly solves have already been solved with tabs. Middle click compose and all of those problems are solved with the added bonus of having an entire screen to write your email in. Google is being taken over by pointy haired managers and marketing. RIP.

I seem to recall that both Google search and Gmail were initially popular with technically sophisticated users. I remember proselytising this amazing new search engine to people still using Lycos, or Yahoo, or Alta Vista, or whatever it was back then. I used to be able to get very accurate results in Google search with judicious use of quotes, excluded terms, and exact phrases. Now, Google second-guesses what I reall…

If you want to mention some recent searches that disappointed you, I'm happy to pass that on to the quality team here.

If you're unhappy that Google is trying to autocorrect spelling or add/remove search terms, you might try the verbatim search tool: http://insidesearch.blogspot.com/2011/11/search-using-your-t...

Post reply on HN