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Burying the URL

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Re: Burying the URL

#111

Post by chrismorgan »

noisy_boy wrote: post #99
canadev wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember talking to a friend who owns a Mercedes recently and he was telling me how he had to take his car into the shop and they gave him a fancy loaner (an ML 63, IIRC). He talked about all the cool gadgetry in there like blind-spot monitors, side rear view mirror wipers, and such. He also mentioned that the cars are pretty much impossible to work on on your own since you need to have the right diagnostic equipme…

> and a well-tucked-away "Advanced" button that, having given the proper warnings, allows the user to poke around on the inside. I simply don't understand that this point, which is bloody obvious, is completely lost on the so many UI (re)designers. I don't mind you simplify (and most of the time thats all we need) but what is the point behind cutting-off all access for good for those who wish to tinker? For example i…

Shifting the add-on bar to an extension is the right way for Firefox to head. The core product is simplified, removing something that a very small fraction of its target audience want, and the feature is shifted into an extension. You can still have it, but it’s shifted out of the core. The maintenance burden is then shifted from its being something that might be accidentally broken in the core product to a separate extension that can focus on that one feature, and do it better.

Re: Burying the URL

#112

Post by bagels »

diminish wrote: post #43
zaroth wrote: post #34

Google heard of this thing called a 'Uniform Resource Locator', and thought, "Hey, that's us!"

If you closely watch Google quarterly financial reports and their search/content ad asset placements, you'll see that they are under tremendous pressure to monetize the web to show the investors they do a fraction of what is possible. Chrome UI updates often have traces of this pressure where search is favored against any other behavior to find information such as bookmarks, history, address bar. Removal of editable…

This has to be one of the main motivating factors, to get more search traffic and thus ad clicks.

If there's no way to enter urls, then all that's left is to search google.

Re: Burying the URL

#113

Post by greggman »

ohleg wrote: post #102
greggman wrote: post #88

This may be the reason I stop using Chrome even though I was a member of the team for 5 years. I NEED TO EDIT URLs. I need to copy and paste URLs. It was already annoying enough with it's removing of the protocol because sometimes I make a typo, try to edit it and it messes up and removes the protocol forcing me to edit it a 3rd time only after it goes as searches for something. Even as just a user I copy and paste U…

I agree, but for the time being you can still click on the actual button, which will let you view/edit the entire URL.

Actually that 'might' be ok. I'd have to try it.

On the other hand seeing the URL helps me decide if I'm on the correct webpage. mybank.com vs pretendingtobemybank.com Of course I try not to click those links in the first place but I do look at the URL to check that some link I clicked took me to the right place.

There's also plenty of apps I use where the URL is useful info. For example JSFiddle. If there's a /N in the URL I know I need to click "Set As Base" before I'm done. Of course if that's the only site I need that on maybe not a good argument. I'll have to think about if that comes up on other sites for me or not. That's also a dev only issue probably.

I wouldn't mind having 2 modes, user mode and dev mode. I can certainly accept that non-devs have different needs than devs. My only point is I'm trying to avoid frustration. I have enough that in my life. I don't want chrome to pile on more and I can see that their current URL bar already causes me frustration often while doing dev and even while just socializing on the net. At some point that frustration will lead me to find something less frustrating.

Re: Burying the URL

#114

Post by nevir »

qwerty_asdf wrote: post #36

I don't understand what "chip" means in this context? When did I miss the boat on all this "chip" business? A URL has a thing called a chip? What?

Chip is a UI term (that widget is a chip, names styled as blocks in a To: field are chips, etc)

Re: Burying the URL

#115

Post by greggman »

deanclatworthy wrote: post #110
greggman wrote: post #88

This may be the reason I stop using Chrome even though I was a member of the team for 5 years. I NEED TO EDIT URLs. I need to copy and paste URLs. It was already annoying enough with it's removing of the protocol because sometimes I make a typo, try to edit it and it messes up and removes the protocol forcing me to edit it a 3rd time only after it goes as searches for something. Even as just a user I copy and paste U…

You can disable it by going to chrome://flags/#origin-chip-in-omnibox, change it to Disabled and restart chrome. Edit: Apparently a useful comment offering a solution to the parent's comment is not HN worthy?

Chrome tries to get rid of flags so likely they'll remove that option in a year or two if they decide no URL is FTW.

Re: Burying the URL

#116

Post by tempestn »

tempestn wrote: post #10

At first I was concerned by this, but as long as the URL is accessible - by clicking the domain chip - I could see this being a good thing. Most non power users never directly manipulate URLs, so there's no real need to display them so prominently. The domain on the other hand is important, and showing only it without the rest of the URL serves to significantly emphasize it. As long as there remains a power user togg…

I should clarify that I would want a power user option to actually turn this behaviour off, beyond the ability to just click to show the URL. Most users don't, but I glance up at the URL fairly frequently to orient myself.

Re: Burying the URL

#117

Post by chrismorgan »

Widdershin wrote: post #27
jeswin wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be gone for now, but someone who made this decision is still making decisions in that team. Honestly, I went OMG when I read the post. Dogfoodable Servo based browser arrives in Q4 this year according to https://github.com/mozilla/servo/wiki/Roadmap . Probably the most important project on the internet right now.

Awesome to see that target. I'm kind of tempted to start learning Rust so I can use and contribute to Servo when that day comes.

You can actually use and contribute to Servo already—it just isn’t at the day‐to‐day browsing stage yet. That’s what’s meant by the Q4 goal.

Re: Burying the URL

#118

Post by cyberneticcook »

greggman wrote: post #88

This may be the reason I stop using Chrome even though I was a member of the team for 5 years. I NEED TO EDIT URLs. I need to copy and paste URLs. It was already annoying enough with it's removing of the protocol because sometimes I make a typo, try to edit it and it messes up and removes the protocol forcing me to edit it a 3rd time only after it goes as searches for something. Even as just a user I copy and paste U…

I copy and paste URLs all day long too. I use CMD+L to select the whole URL and CMD+C to copy it. No big deal.

Re: Burying the URL

#119

Post by drgath »

greggman wrote: post #88

This may be the reason I stop using Chrome even though I was a member of the team for 5 years. I NEED TO EDIT URLs. I need to copy and paste URLs. It was already annoying enough with it's removing of the protocol because sometimes I make a typo, try to edit it and it messes up and removes the protocol forcing me to edit it a 3rd time only after it goes as searches for something. Even as just a user I copy and paste U…

> I NEED TO EDIT URLs.

I'm using Canary with this option enabled, and all you have to do is click the domain box, then you can freely view, edit, and copy the URL.

All this update does is hide the path portion of the URL. That's it, so IMO, this story is way overblown. Google isn't removing the URL bar, they're just acknowledging the fact that 99% of users don't need to see 99% of the URLs they visit on a daily basis.

Why do Hacker News readers need to see a URL that looks like this? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7677031

Why do users looking at Amazon Fire's landing page need to see this? http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00CX5P8FC/ref=amb_link_412...

Why do EBay shoppers need to see this? http://www.ebay.com/itm/Garmin-nuvi-2555LMT-5-GPS-Navigation...

They don't. Just trim it down to the domain and call it good.

Oh, and it's worth mentioning that to copy/paste URLs, it's still only one click away, because when you click the box, it auto-selects the entire URL.

Edit: As I review my post, in the context of this story I find it humorous that even Hacker News trims the URLs I pasted because of how obnoxious and unnecessary they are.

Re: Burying the URL

#120

Post by mpweiher »

pjmlp wrote: post #85
colordrops wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A car has a simple goal: get you from one place to another. A computer does not. It's a general purpose tool that is near infinite in scope and possibility. The analogy is a complete failure.

For most people, "A to B" means getting stuff done, not hacking around with the system. So they won't care about the technology stack, as long as that spreadsheet, text document, 3D image, .... can be edited, saved and printed or a game played.

Glad you put spreadsheet in that list. "Spreadsheet" is also programming, just one form of programming that by accident of history made it to "things users do".
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