6 ms·

Meanwhile, on Windows, there’s nothing left of the browser that looks native.

by fuzzy2 5y ago

perryizgr8 5y ago
On Windows, no app looks "native". There seems to be no standard native Windows look left after years of idiotic redesigns and missteps by Microsoft.
- darkwater 5y ago
  And this is frankly ironic because for so many years one of the biggest complaints against desktop Linux by Windows user was the lack of uniformity between Qt, GTK and other toolkits interfaces.
  - dsego 5y ago
    I doubt that windows users would care, mac users maybe. Number one complaint is lack of pro software like photoshop or ms office.
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      Windows used to be more consistent. Now the Windows users who cared gave up Windows or gave up caring.
- mhd 5y ago
  That's always been the case. After Win95 came out, every OS revision and Office release changed the default look and feel. It was most noticeable in the toolbars. Started out with visually raised buttons (like regular interface buttons), then the buttons went flat, then the whole toolbar was raised via a gradient, then everything went bonkers with ribbons (meanwhile in browsers you had huge buttons with text below as yet another alternative). Or the checkmark/cross ok/cancel buttons that were quite common (Borland?). That "old" look and feel co-existing with "modern" flat/web designs just made the differences more noticeable, never mind the often associated differences in icon sizes and styles. Not that other systems are better. Linux always had too many widget toolkits (and now those awful upside-down window-title-toolbars), and even Macs always had at least one weird option (e.g. brushed metal or too iOS-like thingamajigs).
  - fuzzy2 5y ago
    Ah but you see, all the core details remained the same since Windows 95. Some from even earlier. Flat buttons, raised buttons, buttons with round corners, they all had the same dimensions, margins, padding. Same goes for all the other details like menus. Indeed, this remains the same even today, in the Run dialog, Win32 applications like Notepad, … Some things changed, like window chrome and the shell (taskbar, start menu). Ribbons came. But the core design language remained unchanged. Until Modern UI. The Firefox context menu is of course not “native”. However, in Firefox 88, it has the look I would expect. The way it looks in basically all Win32 applications. In Firefox 89, context menus are inflated, comically large. Just because Microsoft is butchering UI consistency doesn’t mean other software has to follow suit.
satysin 5y ago
Looking "native" on Windows is a very difficult thing these days. To me classic Win32 is what "looks" native whereas all their modern apps like Mail and Calendar don't look native at all even though they are. Office is native but has its own, unique look and feel that is different to other native tab interfaces built into Windows. And don't get me started on context menus in Windows (ironic given this story). The design and items on a context menu is so inconsistent it drives me mad at times. Consistency in Windows is a real pain point imho. I would love for Microsoft to just stop adding more crap to the shell like some weather or contacts fly-out and just spend a year getting everything consistent with a good, modern light and dark theme that works everywhere. I know it is easy for me to say that though.
- AshamedCaptain 5y ago
  (Office is not native. Easy to check since all the controls behave in their own particular ways, even on dialogs, and the look is strikingly different from the rest of the system controls. Most exacerbated if you run Office 9x on NT 3.x).
- crooked-v 5y ago
  It's easy to complain about Apple changing the macOS look every year, but boy, Windows hasn't had a single 'look' since the Windows XP era...
2ion 5y ago
Proton will kill the native LnF on all platforms in Firefox in a Badum! way. The context menu on Windows isn't native either btw, in that it doesn't follow the OS theme. Ironically, on Linux, the context menu has always been properly styled according to the active GTK+ theme...
WhyNotHugo 5y ago
Then again, most MS applications have never looked "native" on Windows either -- it seems each team has always gone for their own style and UX.
Yaina 5y ago
There are a bunch of considerations for the native look-and-feel that go beyond the primary visual aesthetic. Using the OS-specific terms, shortcuts, font-sizes, button order, APIs. This maintenance effort is not trivial. This is all stuff people at Mozilla are trying to look out for. But additionally adopting the design language of the system is another burden altogether. It potentially triples your design- and implementation time and adds a lot of complexity to your code. And if you're unlucky the next OS version requires you to change it all again.
Ashanmaril 5y ago
If you right-click in default Microsoft apps that ship with Windows, you can expect one of like 5 types of menu to appear

Meanwhile, on Windows, there’s nothing left of the browser that looks native.

by fuzzy2 5y ago

Meanwhile, on Windows, there’s nothing left of the browser that looks native.

On Windows, no app looks "native". There seems to be no standard native Windows look left after years of idiotic redesigns and missteps by Microsoft.

darkwater 5y ago
And this is frankly ironic because for so many years one of the biggest complaints against desktop Linux by Windows user was the lack of uniformity between Qt, GTK and other toolkits interfaces.
- dsego 5y ago
  I doubt that windows users would care, mac users maybe. Number one complaint is lack of pro software like photoshop or ms office.
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    Windows used to be more consistent. Now the Windows users who cared gave up Windows or gave up caring.
mhd 5y ago
That's always been the case. After Win95 came out, every OS revision and Office release changed the default look and feel. It was most noticeable in the toolbars. Started out with visually raised buttons (like regular interface buttons), then the buttons went flat, then the whole toolbar was raised via a gradient, then everything went bonkers with ribbons (meanwhile in browsers you had huge buttons with text below as yet another alternative). Or the checkmark/cross ok/cancel buttons that were quite common (Borland?). That "old" look and feel co-existing with "modern" flat/web designs just made the differences more noticeable, never mind the often associated differences in icon sizes and styles. Not that other systems are better. Linux always had too many widget toolkits (and now those awful upside-down window-title-toolbars), and even Macs always had at least one weird option (e.g. brushed metal or too iOS-like thingamajigs).
- fuzzy2 5y ago
  Ah but you see, all the core details remained the same since Windows 95. Some from even earlier. Flat buttons, raised buttons, buttons with round corners, they all had the same dimensions, margins, padding. Same goes for all the other details like menus. Indeed, this remains the same even today, in the Run dialog, Win32 applications like Notepad, … Some things changed, like window chrome and the shell (taskbar, start menu). Ribbons came. But the core design language remained unchanged. Until Modern UI. The Firefox context menu is of course not “native”. However, in Firefox 88, it has the look I would expect. The way it looks in basically all Win32 applications. In Firefox 89, context menus are inflated, comically large. Just because Microsoft is butchering UI consistency doesn’t mean other software has to follow suit.

satysin 5y ago

Looking "native" on Windows is a very difficult thing these days. To me classic Win32 is what "looks" native whereas all their modern apps like Mail and Calendar don't look native at all even though they are. Office is native but has its own, unique look and feel that is different to other native tab interfaces built into Windows. And don't get me started on context menus in Windows (ironic given this story). The design and items on a context menu is so inconsistent it drives me mad at times. Consistency in Windows is a real pain point imho. I would love for Microsoft to just stop adding more crap to the shell like some weather or contacts fly-out and just spend a year getting everything consistent with a good, modern light and dark theme that works everywhere. I know it is easy for me to say that though.

AshamedCaptain 5y ago
(Office is not native. Easy to check since all the controls behave in their own particular ways, even on dialogs, and the look is strikingly different from the rest of the system controls. Most exacerbated if you run Office 9x on NT 3.x).
crooked-v 5y ago
It's easy to complain about Apple changing the macOS look every year, but boy, Windows hasn't had a single 'look' since the Windows XP era...

2ion 5y ago

Proton will kill the native LnF on all platforms in Firefox in a Badum! way. The context menu on Windows isn't native either btw, in that it doesn't follow the OS theme. Ironically, on Linux, the context menu has always been properly styled according to the active GTK+ theme...

WhyNotHugo 5y ago

Then again, most MS applications have never looked "native" on Windows either -- it seems each team has always gone for their own style and UX.

Yaina 5y ago

There are a bunch of considerations for the native look-and-feel that go beyond the primary visual aesthetic. Using the OS-specific terms, shortcuts, font-sizes, button order, APIs. This maintenance effort is not trivial. This is all stuff people at Mozilla are trying to look out for. But additionally adopting the design language of the system is another burden altogether. It potentially triples your design- and implementation time and adds a lot of complexity to your code. And if you're unlucky the next OS version requires you to change it all again.

Ashanmaril 5y ago

If you right-click in default Microsoft apps that ship with Windows, you can expect one of like 5 types of menu to appear