I really like seeing this UI approach becoming more popular. I find it particularly worthwhile because I think it helps build familiarity without being limiting the way simple autocomplete can. This approach broadens the knowledge of the user — even (I think) in the case of something like GitHub where most users are particularly competent.
Introducing the Command Bar
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Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#22I like github for their sweet hosting and easy collaboration. I have no idea who would use this command bar. Do people really want to move the mouse to click on a cli and then guess/remember the syntax? I don't really get why they built this... Anyone?
hitting 's' anywhere on the page activates the command bar. I will use this a lot.
This is the killer feature of this, I am programmed for keyboard shortcuts, its why I'm productive in Vim, its why I use Gnome-do for launching, and its why I feel the web browser is my only real need for a mouse (Vimperator and the like don't seem to do it for me)
Once I hardwire a combination into my head, anything else feels slow and laboured to the point that I hate using it, and often I am found trying to use shortcut keys when a simple mouse touch would work better.
Some people are predominantly mouse people, and if they are productive doing this, this is of course ok, but a feature like this would be an added boon in my opinion for any website.
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#23I like github for their sweet hosting and easy collaboration. I have no idea who would use this command bar. Do people really want to move the mouse to click on a cli and then guess/remember the syntax? I don't really get why they built this... Anyone?
Not leaving the keyboard is one big thing. I ditched webkit for Firefox in order to be able to use Pentadactyl, but it's worth it to not have to leave the home row. Learning a few commands is not hard, and there is always the ol' mouse to fall back upon if you don't want to remember all those commands.
With vimium[1] you get most of the keyboard-functionality in Chrome that Pentadactyl offers for Firefox.
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#24You only miss one thing: * map the '/' symbol to focus:search box.
As burke noted above (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4534670), pressing 's' will activate the search bar.
This was also the one thing I was missing from the post. I did try '/' as well.
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd be pretty happy with Ctrl-(1-9) to action the nth item in the visible list.
No! Ctrl-[1-9], switches between 1-8 and last tabs in Chrome. I know that Alt-[1-9] works too, and is even more cross-browser (works in Firefox), but I still prefer Ctrl. I'm not sure why, though.
Ctrl-[1-9] is the hotkey for Firefox (not Alt-[1-9]).
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
Keyboard is at least 100x as productive as mouse (assuming you know what to do and what to type). Even the best peachy UIs cannot change it. Still there are things that aren't convenient to do from CLI like photo retouching, but these are quite obvious exceptions. That said, I'm not sure what would you like to do in such terminal?
I'd like to search for repos, create new repos, create initial files, edit existing, star/unstar, watch/ignore, work with messages etc.
I agree that a keyboard is orders of magnitude more conducive to productivity, but I'm surprised that you do some of these frequently enough to make learning the commands a worthwhile endeavor, if one of these consoles were available. Even starring/unstarring is something that I do frequently, but I don't think I'd get any boost out of typing 'star' instead of just clicking on the star when my brain is already saying "make that star thing light up."
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#27Death to the CLI/GUI religious wars.
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#28Wow, a command-line interface to a website is something I never thought I'd see.
My first reaction was that it's a step backwards because the usual benefits of a command line aren't present here (you're usually already using your mouse, commands can't be piped, no shell scripts to run things in sequence)...
But I'm intigued -- maybe it's a possible step forwards? The implementation is very well done. I suppose maybe it functions like traditional keyboard shortcuts in a way? To follow a user, instead of finding their page and clicking follow, you just type "@user follow".
Still, all the commands are so basic, and many are infrequently used, I don't really see much of the "shortcut" value. I'm very curious to see if this user interface concept grows. Imagine if this became a standard way to interface with web API's!
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#29Playing with this for a few minutes: * I wish it had vim keybindings (ie, hit esc, then use hjkl to navigate) * It gives me the option to follow myself. (Bug?) * I like how I can learn commands via the autocomplete bar (issue, branch, graph, etc) * I like how the autocomplete bar refreshes after I have control-tabbed away and back. Too many autocompletes lose this behavior * Searching in a repository username/repo do…
It seems like it should emulate readline, doesn't it?
Re: Introducing the Command Bar
#30Playing with this for a few minutes: * I wish it had vim keybindings (ie, hit esc, then use hjkl to navigate) * It gives me the option to follow myself. (Bug?) * I like how I can learn commands via the autocomplete bar (issue, branch, graph, etc) * I like how the autocomplete bar refreshes after I have control-tabbed away and back. Too many autocompletes lose this behavior * Searching in a repository username/repo do…
One could make a measure of velocity for hacker news posts about terminals/CLIs by measuring how fast it takes someone to gripe that it a)doesn't have vim bindings OR b) has vim bindings that feel unnatural ;)