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That’s pretty neat, but it doesn’t justify their UX decisions. Why change something that seemed to work well? Do they have constant feedback on their previous d

That’s pretty neat, but it doesn’t justify their UX decisions. Why change something that seemed to work well? Do they have constant feedback on their previous design? I’m still confused why the tabs look like this. The active tab is so different than the inactive that it’s hard to make a connection between them. Most people already have an association with typical tab UIs. Why change this fundamental perception into something more generic and ambiguous?

capableweb 5y ago
> but it doesn’t justify their UX decisions It doesn't justify shitty UX decisions, no. But it does alleviate the pain you experience when companies (inevitably) do fuck up something you depend on. If the same happened in Chrome or Safari you would have the same chance of adjusting the browser UI as you have adjusting the UX of your toaster (none [or with a lot of work]). Instead, Firefox lets power users be power users, installing extensions that completely changes the UI or adding your own stylesheets for customizations like the ones mentioned in this submission. So booo to the team doing the UX change, yay to Firefox for letting me fix their own mistakes without having to wait for it to be deployed. > Most people already have an association with typical tab UIs. Why change this fundamental perception into something more generic and ambiguous? This was probably said about tabs vs windows when tabs first appeared in browsers as well. Why introduce a different concept when you can already have many windows?! People seem to prefer tabs today, so sometimes going against the wind is a good thing. Problem is that you don't know what will be good until you throw that thing at people and they tell/show you their reaction.
- birksherty 5y ago
  > This was probably said about tabs vs windows when tabs first appeared in browsers as well. Why introduce a different concept when you can already have many windows?! You can justify any bad changes this way and "probably" means you don't know but you just made it up to justify. Tabs made things better we all new when that happend. What good thing the designers thought to introduce this change like in the tabs? These designers have nothing to do at office if they don't. Basically we all are lab rats with every new shiny device or app version that hits now a days. Anyone having fun re-learning new gestures on mobile devices every 2 years?
  - stkdump 5y ago
    I like the new tabs. They don't confuse me. And they look less noisy/calmer/less crowded. The Windows task bar also works nicely without a tab design.
- jehlakj 5y ago
  I applaud the Firefox team to make it possible to customize the UI at such level and I hope that it spawns a lot of beautiful plugins. My biggest gripe is that the default UI doesn’t look like a typical default UI. It looks like a third party plugin that’ll most likely confuse more people than with a plain boring UI.
- ivanche 5y ago
  You can still have many windows, nobody stops you from doing that.
- citrin_ru 5y ago
  > This was probably said about tabs vs windows when tabs first appeared in browsers as well Tabs is a way to group related so windows which useful if you have many of them. And AFIR tabs in browsers was very welcomed by users, unlike today’s nonstop UI churn.
swiley 5y ago
> Do they have constant feedback on their previous design? Why listen to feedback when you have telemetry. (edit: /s for clarity. My point is that telemetry is probably a net negative for many projects.) There's probably a telemetry -> spreadsheet -> powerpoint -> jira workflow that people are doing full time at most companies.
- mixedCase 5y ago
  Taking your comment at face value: because telemetry can lie even more easily than users, pointing the finger at entirely the wrong thing in the worst possible way: with cold, hard numbers to convince most people who don't want to deal with the issue. Telemetry complements feedback, it should never replace it entirely.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
WorldMaker 5y ago
A reasoning given for the change in tabs was a lot of user feedback that people didn't know you could drag and drop to rearrange tabs, but also kept requesting that ability (despite it already being supported). I can almost see the reasoning behind "the attached tab looks far too attached and 'fixed' to the rest of the window so floatable buttons would appear less so and 'easier' to move" and I don't entirely fault it for bad logic, though I also think they could have found a better alternative that didn't feel so drastic a departure from decades of tab UIs (in Firefox previously and elsewhere).
- drw85 5y ago
  Says a lot about the users, when they request an existing feature without trying to do it. I mean it's a simple drag and drop. How do you not try that before? :D
  - kyleee 5y ago
    Partly because due to a decade (or maybe decades?) of constant UI/UX churn in software, operating systems, etc. people are scared to try things for fear of breakage and inability and/or ignorance of how to undo unwanted changes. Speaks to the overall terrible and continuously worsening state of software UI/UX

capableweb 5y ago

> but it doesn’t justify their UX decisions It doesn't justify shitty UX decisions, no. But it does alleviate the pain you experience when companies (inevitably) do fuck up something you depend on. If the same happened in Chrome or Safari you would have the same chance of adjusting the browser UI as you have adjusting the UX of your toaster (none [or with a lot of work]). Instead, Firefox lets power users be power users, installing extensions that completely changes the UI or adding your own stylesheets for customizations like the ones mentioned in this submission. So booo to the team doing the UX change, yay to Firefox for letting me fix their own mistakes without having to wait for it to be deployed. > Most people already have an association with typical tab UIs. Why change this fundamental perception into something more generic and ambiguous? This was probably said about tabs vs windows when tabs first appeared in browsers as well. Why introduce a different concept when you can already have many windows?! People seem to prefer tabs today, so sometimes going against the wind is a good thing. Problem is that you don't know what will be good until you throw that thing at people and they tell/show you their reaction.

birksherty 5y ago
> This was probably said about tabs vs windows when tabs first appeared in browsers as well. Why introduce a different concept when you can already have many windows?! You can justify any bad changes this way and "probably" means you don't know but you just made it up to justify. Tabs made things better we all new when that happend. What good thing the designers thought to introduce this change like in the tabs? These designers have nothing to do at office if they don't. Basically we all are lab rats with every new shiny device or app version that hits now a days. Anyone having fun re-learning new gestures on mobile devices every 2 years?
- stkdump 5y ago
  I like the new tabs. They don't confuse me. And they look less noisy/calmer/less crowded. The Windows task bar also works nicely without a tab design.
jehlakj 5y ago
I applaud the Firefox team to make it possible to customize the UI at such level and I hope that it spawns a lot of beautiful plugins. My biggest gripe is that the default UI doesn’t look like a typical default UI. It looks like a third party plugin that’ll most likely confuse more people than with a plain boring UI.
ivanche 5y ago
You can still have many windows, nobody stops you from doing that.
citrin_ru 5y ago
> This was probably said about tabs vs windows when tabs first appeared in browsers as well Tabs is a way to group related so windows which useful if you have many of them. And AFIR tabs in browsers was very welcomed by users, unlike today’s nonstop UI churn.

swiley 5y ago

> Do they have constant feedback on their previous design? Why listen to feedback when you have telemetry. (edit: /s for clarity. My point is that telemetry is probably a net negative for many projects.) There's probably a telemetry -> spreadsheet -> powerpoint -> jira workflow that people are doing full time at most companies.

mixedCase 5y ago
Taking your comment at face value: because telemetry can lie even more easily than users, pointing the finger at entirely the wrong thing in the worst possible way: with cold, hard numbers to convince most people who don't want to deal with the issue. Telemetry complements feedback, it should never replace it entirely.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

WorldMaker 5y ago

A reasoning given for the change in tabs was a lot of user feedback that people didn't know you could drag and drop to rearrange tabs, but also kept requesting that ability (despite it already being supported). I can almost see the reasoning behind "the attached tab looks far too attached and 'fixed' to the rest of the window so floatable buttons would appear less so and 'easier' to move" and I don't entirely fault it for bad logic, though I also think they could have found a better alternative that didn't feel so drastic a departure from decades of tab UIs (in Firefox previously and elsewhere).

drw85 5y ago
Says a lot about the users, when they request an existing feature without trying to do it. I mean it's a simple drag and drop. How do you not try that before? :D
- kyleee 5y ago
  Partly because due to a decade (or maybe decades?) of constant UI/UX churn in software, operating systems, etc. people are scared to try things for fear of breakage and inability and/or ignorance of how to undo unwanted changes. Speaks to the overall terrible and continuously worsening state of software UI/UX