3 ms·

It's great your browser can now scale to hundreds of tabs, but can your brain handle that many? Can you focus with 200 tabs open? Personally, I feel much bette

by gitgud 4y ago

It's great your browser can now scale to hundreds of tabs, but can your brain handle that many? Can you focus with 200 tabs open? Personally, I feel much better when I close a tab, rather than leave it open. It feels like I'm freeing up RAM in my head...

turdit 4y ago
that’s really interesting
boplicity 4y ago
I do a lot of research for my job; I often open up 30 new tabs in a matter of a minute, and then slowly work through them, a little bit like a checklist, vetting the information in each one. I can imagine using a similar process for even larger number of tabs, but you're right that it gets a bit unwieldy at some point. That being said, Tree Style Tabs in Firefox makes mentally handling large numbers of tabs very easy. Without it, my workflow would not be functional.
themodelplumber 4y ago
The tabs handle it so your brain doesn't have to? Tabs represent productive effort toward a goal, mission, or valued task. https://www.friendlyskies.net/maybe/why-closing-tabs-is-so-hard https://www.friendlyskies.net/maybe/why-closing-tabs-is-so-h... The false dichotomy of "reasonable tabs vs. too many tabs" is an embarrassing result of slow evolution in software design. The fact that humans feel blame for the resulting behavior is 100% wrong and unnecessary.
- hammyhavoc 4y ago
  Eloquent. I've been struggling to put this into words in a way that doesn't sound pretentious, but you nailed it.
  - themodelplumber 4y ago
    Kind of you to say so --Marc
- gitgud 4y ago
  > The false dichotomy of "reasonable tabs vs. too many tabs" is an embarrassing result of slow evolution in software design. The fact that humans feel blame for the resulting behavior is 100% wrong and unnecessary. Interesting, I see your point of view, but I guess my browsing habits are different. Tabs are ephemeral in my opinion and can be closed without a trace at any moment. I can't rely on them being there, so I don't keep hundreds of them open with chains of context. I have a tiny amount of reliance on the browser history to search and re-open pages if needed, or if I actually care about the URL's I'll add bookmarks, or URL's to a document/note.
rjbwork 4y ago
Agree. I have a handful of pinned tabs. My email, messages, and, depending on the machine, a few tabs of research for either my current work task or game I'm playing or project I'm working on. At the end of each day I close all non-pinned tabs. Stuff that I access regularly but not constantly gets bookmarked into some folders.
- hammyhavoc 4y ago
  Pinned tabs were a game changer for me, especially with the notification dots.
throwaway821909 4y ago
Tab hoarder here: mentally, they're somewhere between history and how you probably treat tabs. Probably 90% of my actual switches are within the last 10, another 9% in the last 100, etc. All I really want is infinite storage of pages with exact state, including dynamic content. Since history can't do this I use tabs and wait for the inevitable browser crashes. I think there's no particular moment/decision when a short-term memory becomes a long-term memory, tabs are the closest you can get to this. They're not at the front of my mind.
valbu 4y ago
Because that is completely different approach. When using TST extension then "tab" is like bookmark + history element and not in your short term memory. One of the advantages over those is that visual overview is almost instant and so much clearer with structured tab trees with long descriptive tab names. It reduces brain strain as I no longer have to relay on blind searches in history and bookmakrs menu, google and notes in documents. For example when getting into some game then all the guides, tips, videos, maps, mods etc. are open below one master tab and it is very easy to go back there after every month or so, back and forward works on tabs and you are like exactly back in this moment where had to stop that time. One such subject domain can be like 50 or sometimes 100 tabs and if your interests and work over about a year revolve around 30 subjects then few thousand tab-s is quite normal usage. Firefox + TST works with max 7999 tabs so there is quite some room. I think the easily manageable high tab count is not even the primary advantage for starters, the fixed tab width with vertical tabs is as tab label is always visible and usually horizontal screen space is wasted anyway. Then comes the tree structure advantages and then the paradigm change to tabs as usable history when tab count is high.
hammyhavoc 4y ago
Sure. Like with not using the Start menu on Windows and just hitting the Windows key and typing, I do similar with browser extensionsntombe able to find the point in my workflow in terms of sites that I need at any given moment. Nobody is scrolling through tabs.
dublin 4y ago
My brain only has to focus on ONE at a time. I can be blissfully unaware of the thousands of others that are ready when I decide to pay attention to them. (I also run almost everything fullscreen almost all the time. Even a 4K screen isn't really dense enough for two side-by-side browser windows to render properly.) BTW, one thing I've noticed is that people who like lots of tabs seem to have good/different spatial and directional orientation - I don't know exactly where tabs are, but in my current window, I know for instance, without even thinking about it, that the dozen or so tabs on laser cutters that I rounded up back in April are about 6 scrolls of the mousewheel down from where my email window is pinned at the top, last seen on the left side. (So, maybe 400 tabs down? But I don't think of either of these numbers, just a relative "place". I have FF set to show/scroll three rows of tabs to compromise tab space vs. content space.) It's kind of like why I hate digital books like Kindles - you can never just open the book maybe a bit less than 2/3 through, thinking, "it was about here" and then flip back and forth a few dozen pages to zero in on what you want. (In a real book, though I don't have a "photographic" memory, I usually know whether what I'm looking for was on the right or left page, and sometimes, where it was on the page. I don't think about this, it's just either "there" (usually), or sometimes, not.) "Messy organization" like "piling systems" is usually associated with people who find existing categorization systems (say email or filesystem folders) way too restrictive, and so they find it easier to have multidimensional ways to locate things in space, time, and sensory association. If you don't think this way, more tabs are going to drive you batty. Neither way is right or wrong - people just think differently. Vive la difference!

by gitgud 4y ago

turdit 4y ago

that’s really interesting

boplicity 4y ago

I do a lot of research for my job; I often open up 30 new tabs in a matter of a minute, and then slowly work through them, a little bit like a checklist, vetting the information in each one. I can imagine using a similar process for even larger number of tabs, but you're right that it gets a bit unwieldy at some point. That being said, Tree Style Tabs in Firefox makes mentally handling large numbers of tabs very easy. Without it, my workflow would not be functional.

themodelplumber 4y ago

The tabs handle it so your brain doesn't have to? Tabs represent productive effort toward a goal, mission, or valued task. https://www.friendlyskies.net/maybe/why-closing-tabs-is-so-hard https://www.friendlyskies.net/maybe/why-closing-tabs-is-so-h... The false dichotomy of "reasonable tabs vs. too many tabs" is an embarrassing result of slow evolution in software design. The fact that humans feel blame for the resulting behavior is 100% wrong and unnecessary.

hammyhavoc 4y ago
Eloquent. I've been struggling to put this into words in a way that doesn't sound pretentious, but you nailed it.
- themodelplumber 4y ago
  Kind of you to say so --Marc
gitgud 4y ago
> The false dichotomy of "reasonable tabs vs. too many tabs" is an embarrassing result of slow evolution in software design. The fact that humans feel blame for the resulting behavior is 100% wrong and unnecessary. Interesting, I see your point of view, but I guess my browsing habits are different. Tabs are ephemeral in my opinion and can be closed without a trace at any moment. I can't rely on them being there, so I don't keep hundreds of them open with chains of context. I have a tiny amount of reliance on the browser history to search and re-open pages if needed, or if I actually care about the URL's I'll add bookmarks, or URL's to a document/note.

rjbwork 4y ago

Agree. I have a handful of pinned tabs. My email, messages, and, depending on the machine, a few tabs of research for either my current work task or game I'm playing or project I'm working on. At the end of each day I close all non-pinned tabs. Stuff that I access regularly but not constantly gets bookmarked into some folders.

hammyhavoc 4y ago
Pinned tabs were a game changer for me, especially with the notification dots.

throwaway821909 4y ago

Tab hoarder here: mentally, they're somewhere between history and how you probably treat tabs. Probably 90% of my actual switches are within the last 10, another 9% in the last 100, etc. All I really want is infinite storage of pages with exact state, including dynamic content. Since history can't do this I use tabs and wait for the inevitable browser crashes. I think there's no particular moment/decision when a short-term memory becomes a long-term memory, tabs are the closest you can get to this. They're not at the front of my mind.

valbu 4y ago

Because that is completely different approach. When using TST extension then "tab" is like bookmark + history element and not in your short term memory. One of the advantages over those is that visual overview is almost instant and so much clearer with structured tab trees with long descriptive tab names. It reduces brain strain as I no longer have to relay on blind searches in history and bookmakrs menu, google and notes in documents. For example when getting into some game then all the guides, tips, videos, maps, mods etc. are open below one master tab and it is very easy to go back there after every month or so, back and forward works on tabs and you are like exactly back in this moment where had to stop that time. One such subject domain can be like 50 or sometimes 100 tabs and if your interests and work over about a year revolve around 30 subjects then few thousand tab-s is quite normal usage. Firefox + TST works with max 7999 tabs so there is quite some room. I think the easily manageable high tab count is not even the primary advantage for starters, the fixed tab width with vertical tabs is as tab label is always visible and usually horizontal screen space is wasted anyway. Then comes the tree structure advantages and then the paradigm change to tabs as usable history when tab count is high.

hammyhavoc 4y ago

Sure. Like with not using the Start menu on Windows and just hitting the Windows key and typing, I do similar with browser extensionsntombe able to find the point in my workflow in terms of sites that I need at any given moment. Nobody is scrolling through tabs.

dublin 4y ago

My brain only has to focus on ONE at a time. I can be blissfully unaware of the thousands of others that are ready when I decide to pay attention to them. (I also run almost everything fullscreen almost all the time. Even a 4K screen isn't really dense enough for two side-by-side browser windows to render properly.) BTW, one thing I've noticed is that people who like lots of tabs seem to have good/different spatial and directional orientation - I don't know exactly where tabs are, but in my current window, I know for instance, without even thinking about it, that the dozen or so tabs on laser cutters that I rounded up back in April are about 6 scrolls of the mousewheel down from where my email window is pinned at the top, last seen on the left side. (So, maybe 400 tabs down? But I don't think of either of these numbers, just a relative "place". I have FF set to show/scroll three rows of tabs to compromise tab space vs. content space.) It's kind of like why I hate digital books like Kindles - you can never just open the book maybe a bit less than 2/3 through, thinking, "it was about here" and then flip back and forth a few dozen pages to zero in on what you want. (In a real book, though I don't have a "photographic" memory, I usually know whether what I'm looking for was on the right or left page, and sometimes, where it was on the page. I don't think about this, it's just either "there" (usually), or sometimes, not.) "Messy organization" like "piling systems" is usually associated with people who find existing categorization systems (say email or filesystem folders) way too restrictive, and so they find it easier to have multidimensional ways to locate things in space, time, and sensory association. If you don't think this way, more tabs are going to drive you batty. Neither way is right or wrong - people just think differently. Vive la difference!