6 ms·

I hate that you can't even view Google groups without an account. It also requires us to do nothing but show text. To me groups and blogger has always represent

I hate that you can't even view Google groups without an account. It also requires us to do nothing but show text. To me groups and blogger has always represented what a terrible web application is.

aceoflzlz 9y ago
I don't have an account and I could read that just fine.
dmm 9y ago
Google only asks you to login if it knows you have an account.
- jimktrains2 9y ago
  That still feels like a problem to me. Just show it as unauthenticated if I'm not authenticated.
- mrguyorama 9y ago
  I find the fact that google feels it's okay to track you like that disturbing
- dingo_bat 9y ago
  Somehow that's even worse.
- Analemma_ 9y ago
  That doesn’t make it ok. If anything that’s worse.
- acdha 9y ago
  The problem is that they completely botched the user experience a decade ago and since it's yet another orphaned product it's never been improved. How it should work following a “build your first web app” tutorial: 1. User opens page 2. You detect an old login cookie and discretely ask if they want to login 3. If they do so, you see the previous page with more UI (e.g. subscribe, reply, etc.) How it works now: 1. Users opens page 2. Instead of looking at the content they wanted to see, the user is automatically redirected over to a login page with a mandatory full two-factor check even if you've recently logged in to other Google properties 3. After completing that process, you're dumped on the groups.google.com homepage 4. Since there were a bunch of redirects, you have to know how to use your browser's history to go back 3-4 pages because simply hitting back will just redirect you to the homepage again.
dingo_bat 9y ago
Blogger doesn't even load if you have js disabled.
neonate 9y ago
Hey! this works: http://archive.is/ma8Iw http://archive.is/ma8Iw. I didn't expect it to.
- dang 9y ago
  Let's try changing the URL to that from https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/mechanical-sympathy/L9mHTbeQLNU https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/mechanical-sympath.... I don't like obscuring the original domain but agree that Google Groups URLs posted to HN have consistently been annoying.
- makomk 9y ago
  I think archive.is do a lot of magic on the backend so that stuff like this just works for users.
igravious 9y ago
God I hate Google Groups. I actually need some info from some of those groups and because of account b0rkage and shenanigans it is just too much of a hassle. Weren't they originally Usenet groups or something? Initially they were being decent Web stewards of them (_that_ was a long time ago) but then they got subsumed into the corp. as all things must. It's as inevitable as night follows day. Utter shame.
- nas 9y ago
  They screwed them up in pretty impressive fashion. Years ago, Google Groups used to be a great interface for searching Usenet archives. Now, it is near useless. As an example, I wanted to do some research on early language features of Python (e.g. around 1993). The info is in Usenet postings of that time, surely present in Google Groups years ago. Now, I can't find anything useful. A advanced search using dates doesn't return anything. Their user interface is horribly bad compared to what it used to be. Another example: I did some research on Deep Blue and Deep Thought, after reading Crazy Bird's book. With the old Google Groups, I could follow the discussion of the Deep Blue tournament, in chronological order. There was all sorts of interesting things like computer chess programmers speculating on how Deep Blue worked and people posting analysis of chess positions. All that is now gone or at least not searchable. So sad that all of this knowledge has apparently disappeared. There was loads of information shared on Usenet and the storage space required to preserve it would be trivial.
  - igravious 9y ago
    I thought their mission statement was, "organise the world's information and make it accessible" or something like that. Didn't know there was an asterisk–but not Usenet…
- hinkley 9y ago
  Google bought Deja News and turned it into Groups.
  - igravious 9y ago

I hate that you can't even view Google groups without an account. It also requires us to do nothing but show text. To me groups and blogger has always represented what a terrible web application is.

aceoflzlz 9y ago

I don't have an account and I could read that just fine.

dmm 9y ago

Google only asks you to login if it knows you have an account.

jimktrains2 9y ago
That still feels like a problem to me. Just show it as unauthenticated if I'm not authenticated.
mrguyorama 9y ago
I find the fact that google feels it's okay to track you like that disturbing
dingo_bat 9y ago
Somehow that's even worse.
Analemma_ 9y ago
That doesn’t make it ok. If anything that’s worse.
acdha 9y ago
The problem is that they completely botched the user experience a decade ago and since it's yet another orphaned product it's never been improved. How it should work following a “build your first web app” tutorial: 1. User opens page 2. You detect an old login cookie and discretely ask if they want to login 3. If they do so, you see the previous page with more UI (e.g. subscribe, reply, etc.) How it works now: 1. Users opens page 2. Instead of looking at the content they wanted to see, the user is automatically redirected over to a login page with a mandatory full two-factor check even if you've recently logged in to other Google properties 3. After completing that process, you're dumped on the groups.google.com homepage 4. Since there were a bunch of redirects, you have to know how to use your browser's history to go back 3-4 pages because simply hitting back will just redirect you to the homepage again.

dingo_bat 9y ago

Blogger doesn't even load if you have js disabled.

neonate 9y ago

Hey! this works: http://archive.is/ma8Iw http://archive.is/ma8Iw. I didn't expect it to.

dang 9y ago
Let's try changing the URL to that from https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/mechanical-sympathy/L9mHTbeQLNU https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/mechanical-sympath.... I don't like obscuring the original domain but agree that Google Groups URLs posted to HN have consistently been annoying.
makomk 9y ago
I think archive.is do a lot of magic on the backend so that stuff like this just works for users.

igravious 9y ago

God I hate Google Groups. I actually need some info from some of those groups and because of account b0rkage and shenanigans it is just too much of a hassle. Weren't they originally Usenet groups or something? Initially they were being decent Web stewards of them (_that_ was a long time ago) but then they got subsumed into the corp. as all things must. It's as inevitable as night follows day. Utter shame.

nas 9y ago
They screwed them up in pretty impressive fashion. Years ago, Google Groups used to be a great interface for searching Usenet archives. Now, it is near useless. As an example, I wanted to do some research on early language features of Python (e.g. around 1993). The info is in Usenet postings of that time, surely present in Google Groups years ago. Now, I can't find anything useful. A advanced search using dates doesn't return anything. Their user interface is horribly bad compared to what it used to be. Another example: I did some research on Deep Blue and Deep Thought, after reading Crazy Bird's book. With the old Google Groups, I could follow the discussion of the Deep Blue tournament, in chronological order. There was all sorts of interesting things like computer chess programmers speculating on how Deep Blue worked and people posting analysis of chess positions. All that is now gone or at least not searchable. So sad that all of this knowledge has apparently disappeared. There was loads of information shared on Usenet and the storage space required to preserve it would be trivial.
- igravious 9y ago
  I thought their mission statement was, "organise the world's information and make it accessible" or something like that. Didn't know there was an asterisk–but not Usenet…
hinkley 9y ago
Google bought Deja News and turned it into Groups.
- igravious 9y ago