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Firefox 29

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Re: Firefox 29

#111

Post by pablobm »

dilap wrote: post #63

I love Firefox -- for what it's done, what it represents, and what it helps guard against. I have fond memories of those early versions of Firefox (nee Firebird) that busted open the IE monopoly, and where hands-down the best browser going at the time. But it's never felt very good on the Mac to me, and it still doesn't. Here's a few early thoughts on this release, from the perspective of a happy Safari user, w/ a pr…

  > Separate address and search bars is old-fashioned.
  > As a user, I don't want to have to make this
  > distinction, and it's hard to imagine most
  > users-on-street wouldn't find this confusing
Although a UI problem, this is actually a privacy feature.

As you type into the search bar, autocomplete queries are sent to the search provider. This happens even if your intention was not to search, but just to enter URL manually.

In simpler terms: you are telling Google what sites you are visiting even when you don't use Google.

(AndrewDucker mentions this on this thread too, but his comment emphasises the UI aspect, whereas I think the privacy aspect needs to be stressed).

Re: Firefox 29

#112

Post by espadrine »

davidcollantes wrote: post #36

I have not downloaded it, so forgive me if it is there and I don't see it. Still no omnibar? Why a separated dedicated search field?

"Omnibar" is how Chrome calls it. "Awesome bar" is the name Firefox had given its own, even before then.

The main difference is that the Omnibar logs all your keystrokes to Google's servers. The Awesome bar searches through the data it already has locally (bookmarks, history, open tabs), and it makes a Google search if the data you entered isn't a URL. Not logging your keystrokes is a privacy feature. On the other hand, the dedicated search field does, and that's its feature.

I personally can't see the difference in usage between the Omnibar and the Awesome bar, apart from the fact that the search suggestions make more sense in the Awesome bar, since it only uses my past searches. Follow my advice: use the brand new interface customization UX and remove the dedicated search field.

Re: Firefox 29

#113

Post by mrec »

stefantalpalaru wrote: post #82
a3n wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one that got me was when they took away 'n' to get to the next search result. Not anything to rage quit over, but it pissed me off. I now use VimFX for a few vim navigation keys, and vim-like search.

They replaced it with F3 for some reason.

Maybe because it's the Windows standard, and they think there are more Windows users than vim users?

Re: Firefox 29

#114

Post by cookiecaper »

conductor wrote: post #110
dilap wrote: post #63

I love Firefox -- for what it's done, what it represents, and what it helps guard against. I have fond memories of those early versions of Firefox (nee Firebird) that busted open the IE monopoly, and where hands-down the best browser going at the time. But it's never felt very good on the Mac to me, and it still doesn't. Here's a few early thoughts on this release, from the perspective of a happy Safari user, w/ a pr…

> Separate address and search bars is old-fashioned. As a user, I don't want to have to make this distinction, and it's hard to imagine most users-on-street wouldn't find this confusing As a user, I want separate edit bars for separate functions. I don't want Google know everything I type (or mistype) in the address bar. When I type foobar in the address bar please give me anything that returned the web server at foo…

I encourage Chrome users to go check the search history attached to their Google account. It exposes a lot of data that you didn't realize you were sending to Google (including letter-by-letter entry of search terms/urls) and may give a newfound respect for Firefox's separation, whether you personally care enough to make the switch or not.

Re: Firefox 29

#115

Post by drewblay »

nailer wrote: post #91
danford wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Separate address and search bars is old-fashioned. As a user, I don't want to have to make this distinction, and it's hard to imagine most users-on-street wouldn't find this confusing Use the customizer. People complain when they change and complain when they don't > The address bar is square edged while the search bar is round edged, which is displeasingly visually. (I realize this is because there's a convention o…

>> Separate address and search bars is old-fashioned. As a user, I don't want to have to make this distinction, and it's hard to imagine most users-on-street wouldn't find this confusing > Use the customizer. Most users-on-street don't want to customise either. Edit: The moderation on this is baffling. Does anyone genuinely believe users want to customise to achieve reasonable defaults? HN should ban new users from m…

> Most users-on-street don't want to customize either.

Most users on the street aren't on the hacker news forum. Also if you are going to play the "most users on the street" game, then most users on the street aren't going to install a browser that didn't come with the OS.

Re: Firefox 29

#116

Post by danford »

epochwolf wrote: post #109
danford wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If I were to maximize Sublime on [...] Linux. I don't use sublime, but on Linux (Ubuntu GNOME) when you full screen an app the window decorations are hidden and so are the status/window menus. Edit: before you downvote, please explain why??

You're being downvoted because you are incorrect. Ubuntu GNOME does not have an equivalent of OS X full screen build in to the windowing system. It has a maximize button that doesn't remove the chrome, it just makes the window take up the most of the screen. In OS X, there is no window. The app is completely edge to edge similar like an iOS app except without the status bar. Edit: Ubuntu "Fullscreen": http://1.bp.blo…

But that's not full screen though. That's maximize, you are incorrect.

http://i.imgur.com/lO0g7oS.gif

Re: Firefox 29

#117

Post by ghshephard »

dilap wrote: post #63

I love Firefox -- for what it's done, what it represents, and what it helps guard against. I have fond memories of those early versions of Firefox (nee Firebird) that busted open the IE monopoly, and where hands-down the best browser going at the time. But it's never felt very good on the Mac to me, and it still doesn't. Here's a few early thoughts on this release, from the perspective of a happy Safari user, w/ a pr…

"Separate address and search bars is old-fashioned"

Chrome is almost unusable for me because I can no longer type the names of internal websites and have them come up. That single change in its behavior drives me back to Firefox.

Re: Firefox 29

#118

Post by nnnnni »

cookiecaper wrote: post #114
conductor wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Separate address and search bars is old-fashioned. As a user, I don't want to have to make this distinction, and it's hard to imagine most users-on-street wouldn't find this confusing As a user, I want separate edit bars for separate functions. I don't want Google know everything I type (or mistype) in the address bar. When I type foobar in the address bar please give me anything that returned the web server at foo…

I encourage Chrome users to go check the search history attached to their Google account. It exposes a lot of data that you didn't realize you were sending to Google (including letter-by-letter entry of search terms/urls) and may give a newfound respect for Firefox's separation, whether you personally care enough to make the switch or not.

I only use Chromium because it's supposed to not have the phone-home "features" that are in Chrome.

...or at least it's that they claim.

EDIT: "they" being Google. http://blog.chromium.org/2008/10/google-chrome-chromium-and-...

Re: Firefox 29

#120

Post by sspiff »

conductor wrote: post #110
dilap wrote: post #63

I love Firefox -- for what it's done, what it represents, and what it helps guard against. I have fond memories of those early versions of Firefox (nee Firebird) that busted open the IE monopoly, and where hands-down the best browser going at the time. But it's never felt very good on the Mac to me, and it still doesn't. Here's a few early thoughts on this release, from the perspective of a happy Safari user, w/ a pr…

> Separate address and search bars is old-fashioned. As a user, I don't want to have to make this distinction, and it's hard to imagine most users-on-street wouldn't find this confusing As a user, I want separate edit bars for separate functions. I don't want Google know everything I type (or mistype) in the address bar. When I type foobar in the address bar please give me anything that returned the web server at foo…

I agree, though Firefox's awesomebar (if it's still called that) already integrates search, and seems to autocomplete to things I've never visited with suggested search queries. This might be related to my use of the DuckDuckGo extension though.

I also use ctrl-L and ctrl-K for navigating and searching, respectively, and I've found the way Chrome handles ctrl-K by focusing on the navigation bar and filling it with a '?' lacking. For instance, it clears my last query, where I often refine queries after quickly inspecting the results I got first time around. The requirement of having a '?' in front of search queries is also annoying, since it hinders a lot of keyboard shortcuts. Most notably, if I change my mind, Ctrl-A doesn't allow me to restart typing a query without manually inserting the '?' again.

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