5 ms·

which doesnt disappear on focus is bad UI

23 points by barredo 16y ago

samps 16y ago
Alternatively: detect when a URL is pasted and remove the placeholder http:// http:// only then. I certainly type URLs sometimes and would find it disorienting if the http:// http:// just disappeared when I started typing.
- glhaynes 16y ago
  But how would I know it's going to do that? I'm gonna delete the http:// http:// if I've already got an http:// http:// on the clipboard because I can't be sure it behaves unlike every other text box I'm used to using.
- zach 16y ago
  If it disappears on focus, it's before you start typing (or pasting).
Zak 16y ago
I think the best thing to do is check the URL server-side. If it doesn't contain a protocol, add http:// http://, otherwise keep the supplied protocol.
- petervandijck 16y ago
  You should always check serverside, but this post is about the user experience of entering the url, not about what happens to it once sent to the server. The letters http:// http:// help I think, they suggest what's supposed to go in the field. A lot of people don't know what "url" means but they recognize the http:// http://.
  - glhaynes 16y ago
    Good point. This is where a light gray "http://something.com/ http://something.com/ in the background of the text field (disappears on focus) is nice.
- erydo 16y ago
  The protocol tells the browser which port to connect to on the server. That can't be done server-side.
  - warwick 16y ago
    In this case, where you're typing the URL in a form, presumably as some sort of content management system, you're not telling your browser to go directly to the URL but rather saying 'I want to use this resource, it's at this URL'. Before it uses that URL for anything, the server should process it, and if it's missing something like a protocol, add in a good default like http.
    - ars 16y ago
      It never even gets to a server if it doesn't have a protocol. The browser would have no idea what to do with it. It wouldn't even know how to understand it. Is: foo@bar.com mailto:foo@bar.com or ftp://foo@bar.com or http://foo@bar.com Each one of those does something totally different, and all are legal. The browser can add a default though - and it does.
      - tedunangst 16y ago
        It's a text field in a form. The browser doesn't need to have any ideas about what to do with it except submit it to the server.
        ars 16y ago
        Submit it how? Submit it where? It's obvious you know nothing about this. Each one of those protocols works totally different. Different ports, different messages to the server, different ways of contacting the server. And it's not a text field either. It gets broken up into multiple pieces and each piece is used in a different part of the conversation with the server. And on top of that you need to understand the format to even figure out which server to talk to.
petercooper 16y ago
No one types out URLs An unfounded assumption. I type out URLs quite often on things like blog comments or when creating accounts on new webapps. I'm not sure why I'd go to my own Web site or Twitter page and copy/paste the URL when I can type it a lot quicker. Further, you don't have to "delete" the existing "http:// http:// when pasting. Just double click in the field to have all the text selected, then paste. It replaces the existing contents. Adds the time it takes to do a double click or press Ctrl/Cmd+A. The problem with UI suggestions is that even when they're logical and seem to make sense, they won't for everybody - especially not those who've become so used to working around the problem, that a "solution" could expend more mental effort than following how everyone else does it already.
- rlpb 16y ago
  > Just double click in the field to have all the text selected, then paste. This won't work when using the primary selection (ie. middle-click paste) in X. Selecting the text wipes out the previous selection.
  - petercooper 16y ago
    I might be missing your point, but I repeated the steps I mentioned in Ubuntu and have success. No middle click pasting though, just the OS X/Windows/everyone else standard of either context menu pasting or Ctrl+V. I recorded it too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZl3gTzqyKA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZl3gTzqyKA What am I missing?
    - megablast 16y ago
      For unix systems with X, you copy the text by selecting it. So when you want to paste a URL, selecting the old URL to delete it will overwrite the copied URL. You would need to delete it first, and then copy the URL you are after.
      - petercooper 16y ago
        Again, though, I think I'm missing something. Isn't the windowing system Ubuntu uses X? In my video demo I "select" the contents of the text box, yet the existing contents of the clipboard remains. Or is this something Ubuntu does to keep us "other platform" migrators happy?
fookyong 16y ago
case-by-case, angry young Padawan.
detcader 16y ago
Tumblr is horrible with this. If you want to set a click-through link for a new photo post, it's usually click-[ctrl a]-backspace-[ctrl v] as a click-through link is really never typed out, but is most likely pre-existing.
- spicyj 16y ago
  You know, you can skip the backspace; pasting something with a selection will replace the selected text with whatever's on the pasteboard (at least on all the systems I've had experience with).
  - detcader 16y ago
    Not the case here.. in Chrome on Linux in /new/photo clicking the box after clicking "Set a click-through link" highlights either nothing or the last '/'.
    - spicyj 16y ago
      I said you can skip the backspace, not the Ctrl-A.
jay_kyburz 16y ago
You know what is bad ui though, have an image of a ui element and make it a hyper link so that when you click on it you are taken away from the page you are reading to a page containing only the image.
_delirium 16y ago
This frequently bites me when using archive.org's wayback machine. I usually use it to retrieve a page that I found a link to that now appears to be down, so I almost exclusively copy/paste there, and almost always get as my first result something like, 0 pages found for http://http:/www.archive.org/index.php* http://http:/www.archive.org/index.php* At the very least, if you are going to have that as your UI, it'd be nice if the server would notice and strip the doubled http prefix.
robotron 16y ago
... just use "placeholder" in HTML5. Problem solved.
jacobbijani 16y ago
Thanks, I'll think about it. I'm pretty sure we do add the "http:// http:// if you forget it, but we don't strip duplicate protocols out. I can check for that as well. "Terrible" might be a bit far, though.

23 points by barredo 16y ago

samps 16y ago

Alternatively: detect when a URL is pasted and remove the placeholder http:// http:// only then. I certainly type URLs sometimes and would find it disorienting if the http:// http:// just disappeared when I started typing.

glhaynes 16y ago
But how would I know it's going to do that? I'm gonna delete the http:// http:// if I've already got an http:// http:// on the clipboard because I can't be sure it behaves unlike every other text box I'm used to using.
zach 16y ago
If it disappears on focus, it's before you start typing (or pasting).

Zak 16y ago

I think the best thing to do is check the URL server-side. If it doesn't contain a protocol, add http:// http://, otherwise keep the supplied protocol.

petervandijck 16y ago
You should always check serverside, but this post is about the user experience of entering the url, not about what happens to it once sent to the server. The letters http:// http:// help I think, they suggest what's supposed to go in the field. A lot of people don't know what "url" means but they recognize the http:// http://.
- glhaynes 16y ago
  Good point. This is where a light gray "http://something.com/ http://something.com/ in the background of the text field (disappears on focus) is nice.
erydo 16y ago
The protocol tells the browser which port to connect to on the server. That can't be done server-side.
- warwick 16y ago
  In this case, where you're typing the URL in a form, presumably as some sort of content management system, you're not telling your browser to go directly to the URL but rather saying 'I want to use this resource, it's at this URL'. Before it uses that URL for anything, the server should process it, and if it's missing something like a protocol, add in a good default like http.
  - ars 16y ago
    It never even gets to a server if it doesn't have a protocol. The browser would have no idea what to do with it. It wouldn't even know how to understand it. Is: foo@bar.com mailto:foo@bar.com or ftp://foo@bar.com or http://foo@bar.com Each one of those does something totally different, and all are legal. The browser can add a default though - and it does.
    - tedunangst 16y ago
      It's a text field in a form. The browser doesn't need to have any ideas about what to do with it except submit it to the server.
      - ars 16y ago
        Submit it how? Submit it where? It's obvious you know nothing about this. Each one of those protocols works totally different. Different ports, different messages to the server, different ways of contacting the server. And it's not a text field either. It gets broken up into multiple pieces and each piece is used in a different part of the conversation with the server. And on top of that you need to understand the format to even figure out which server to talk to.

petercooper 16y ago

No one types out URLs An unfounded assumption. I type out URLs quite often on things like blog comments or when creating accounts on new webapps. I'm not sure why I'd go to my own Web site or Twitter page and copy/paste the URL when I can type it a lot quicker. Further, you don't have to "delete" the existing "http:// http:// when pasting. Just double click in the field to have all the text selected, then paste. It replaces the existing contents. Adds the time it takes to do a double click or press Ctrl/Cmd+A. The problem with UI suggestions is that even when they're logical and seem to make sense, they won't for everybody - especially not those who've become so used to working around the problem, that a "solution" could expend more mental effort than following how everyone else does it already.

rlpb 16y ago
> Just double click in the field to have all the text selected, then paste. This won't work when using the primary selection (ie. middle-click paste) in X. Selecting the text wipes out the previous selection.
- petercooper 16y ago
  I might be missing your point, but I repeated the steps I mentioned in Ubuntu and have success. No middle click pasting though, just the OS X/Windows/everyone else standard of either context menu pasting or Ctrl+V. I recorded it too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZl3gTzqyKA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZl3gTzqyKA What am I missing?
  - megablast 16y ago
    For unix systems with X, you copy the text by selecting it. So when you want to paste a URL, selecting the old URL to delete it will overwrite the copied URL. You would need to delete it first, and then copy the URL you are after.
    - petercooper 16y ago
      Again, though, I think I'm missing something. Isn't the windowing system Ubuntu uses X? In my video demo I "select" the contents of the text box, yet the existing contents of the clipboard remains. Or is this something Ubuntu does to keep us "other platform" migrators happy?

fookyong 16y ago

case-by-case, angry young Padawan.

detcader 16y ago

Tumblr is horrible with this. If you want to set a click-through link for a new photo post, it's usually click-[ctrl a]-backspace-[ctrl v] as a click-through link is really never typed out, but is most likely pre-existing.

spicyj 16y ago
You know, you can skip the backspace; pasting something with a selection will replace the selected text with whatever's on the pasteboard (at least on all the systems I've had experience with).
- detcader 16y ago
  Not the case here.. in Chrome on Linux in /new/photo clicking the box after clicking "Set a click-through link" highlights either nothing or the last '/'.
  - spicyj 16y ago
    I said you can skip the backspace, not the Ctrl-A.

jay_kyburz 16y ago

You know what is bad ui though, have an image of a ui element and make it a hyper link so that when you click on it you are taken away from the page you are reading to a page containing only the image.

_delirium 16y ago

This frequently bites me when using archive.org's wayback machine. I usually use it to retrieve a page that I found a link to that now appears to be down, so I almost exclusively copy/paste there, and almost always get as my first result something like, 0 pages found for http://http:/www.archive.org/index.php* http://http:/www.archive.org/index.php* At the very least, if you are going to have that as your UI, it'd be nice if the server would notice and strip the doubled http prefix.

robotron 16y ago

... just use "placeholder" in HTML5. Problem solved.

jacobbijani 16y ago

Thanks, I'll think about it. I'm pretty sure we do add the "http:// http:// if you forget it, but we don't strip duplicate protocols out. I can check for that as well. "Terrible" might be a bit far, though.