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Firefox has one of these when a tab process crashes: "Gah. Your tab just crashed." https://user-media-prod-cdn.itsre-sumo.mozilla.net/uploads/images/2017-08-11

• staticassertion 4y ago
  You're reading way too much into it. It's just a cute error message, not some psyop to try to trick you into blaming yourself.
• routerl 4y ago
  Yeah, I think there are two approaches to any text a user sees in your app: is it copy, or is it data? The file/edit/etc menus are data. Concise, clear errors are data. "Gah. Your tab just crashed" is copy.
• reaperducer 4y ago
  I don't get shock from "Gah." I get embarrassment and disappointment, which seems appropriate for the situation. Firefox is ashamed that it screwed up. Then again, I'm from the age when the internet was still fun, and everything didn't have to be corporate, uniform, serious, and boring.
  • Brian_K_White 4y ago
    I get fatuous inauthenticity. It's a computer program not a person, and no single person wrote it or actually feels any aggrieved embarassement for that mishap, since they aren't manually performing the task that went wrong. They may say "gah" sincerely sometime later when they read a bug report, but that is some entirely seperate thing.
    • KerrAvon 4y ago
      This, right here. Exactly this.
    • ectopod 4y ago
      Yes. British railway stations have a computerised voice apologising for the delayed trains. If it was a human making these announcements I could imagine them feeling a smidgen of regret. But with a computer I know nobody gives a shit.
  • registeredcorn 4y ago
    Although I do miss the fun and playful nature of the old internet, before corporations moved in, I would still ask you to consider the following: You dial a wrong number. Which do you prefer to hear This, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTNthUcvyEM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTNthUcvyEM Or this, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qzr-V-ttZ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qzr-V-ttZ8 If you're just trying to call a friend, and you put in a wrong digit, the fun response might be a brief chance to have a good laugh at yourself, but, if you are doing something like say trying to call a doctor to ask for lab results on a cancer screening, or you're trying to call the bank to report a stolen credit card, and you get the wacky "Whoops! Looks like you you need to get a dialing wand! lol"[1] response, it is not going to be well received. I guess what I'm trying to say is that a joke message can have a certain place, but I think that it means the developer has to take some time to consider "Is this ever going to be used for something serious or time sensitive?" If it's just a small project, who cares? But if it's going to be used by more than a friend group, or a niche circle of 100-500 users, it's probably better off left in as a joke comment, instead of a user-facing error message. [1] https://youtu.be/npSVS9CJyPc?t=20 https://youtu.be/npSVS9CJyPc?t=20
  • whatshisface 4y ago
    All the fun will be sucked out of software development one mildly offended HNer at a time.
    • elzbardico 4y ago
      We should never take HNers too seriously lest we suck all the fun from everything in life.
    • KerrAvon 4y ago
      There is always plenty of fun to be had in software. It should never be had at the expense of users.
    • yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
      I don't inherently mind fun, but error messages being fun/cutesy is not the time.
    • mlyle 4y ago
      Doing things that are kind of funny for the developers, and then ordinary users have wildly varying opinions of... isn't so great.
      • Spivak 4y ago
        You could make that argument about any copy. If you pick something neutral tone someone will say it's sterile and uncaring. If you pick something technical someone will say it's pointless and confusing. If you pick something firm someone will say its angry or condescending.
        • mlyle 4y ago
          Yes, but I like the reference to Scalzi someone else made in this thread: the failure state of clever is "asshole." Sterile, professional, and uncaring is a heck of a lot better than a chunk of the user population thinking "it's worse than them not caring-- they're actively mocking our complaints/problems!"
    • 4y ago
  • thrown_22 4y ago
    You were 12 using the hard work of a generation of engineers to surf geocities without knowing it. >When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things The current generation of engineers didn't get the memo.
    • reaperducer 4y ago
      You were 12 using the hard work of a generation of engineers to surt geocities without knowing it. You make poor assumptions. I was banging out code for a chemical company on a green screen Wyse terminal and sending e-mail with bang paths.
      • thrown_22 4y ago
        That you think the internet should be whimsical and fun explains the state of security on SCADA devices.
        • paulryanrogers 4y ago
          Damn. Why so harsh? Does the Internet need to be regulated like industrial control devices? Should we get permission from AT&T to certify what we can connect to the network? The Internet is a tool for everyone, not just gray-beard, elitist gate-keepers. There is room to experiment, make mistakes, and even harmless fun. Keep in mind Firefox is the least corporate of all major browsers--recent CEO shenanigans not withstanding. EDIT: > You were 12 using the hard work of a generation of engineers to surf geocities without knowing it. Um, so? Thousands of generations of inventors toiled away for you to even touch a computing device (fire, argiculture, rule of law, professional armies, enlightenment, vacuum tubes etc.)
        • monkey_monkey 4y ago
  • umeshunni 4y ago
    I think you're highlighting the issue on why this is a bad choice. Words like "gah" mean different things to different people. They may not even mean anything at all to non native English speakers.
    • Aeolun 4y ago
      If they are aiming to use their browser in English I don’t think that’s bad? Firefox is translated into many languages, so if someone uses the English version it’s likely deliberate.
      • yencabulator 4y ago
        English as a second language speaker here. I've used all programs in English for a very long time because 1) the translations universally suck 2) the non-English terms are more cumbersome, confusing, and harder to look up.
      • tomrod 4y ago
        Gah is bad because (1) it is not precise, (2) it has inconsistent connotation.
        • Brian_K_White 4y ago
          It's bad because it's Clippy.
  • swatcoder 4y ago
    I'm from that age too, but it groomed me to cringe when a $XXM international corporate brand tries to be casual and fun. It doesn't feel authentic. It doesn't feel like it speaks from some relaxed, hacker culture at Mozilla. It feels like somebody in a designer hoodie with an ocean view conference room wants to brand Firefox as the fun alternative. It only makes me miss those old days more.
    • Animats 4y ago
      "It feels like somebody in a designer hoodie with an ocean view conference room wants to brand Firefox as the fun alternative." Ah, you've seen the view from their SF offices.[1] [1] https://earth.google.com/web/search/@37.78972221,-122.38883379,6.18718652a,0d,60y,68.37953972h,102.90272175t,0r https://earth.google.com/web/search/@37.78972221,-122.388833...
    • staticassertion 4y ago
      The only time I've seen a cute error added it was an engineer who just wanted to add some playfulness to the product.
    • bigDinosaur 4y ago
      My memory of the 'old days' was that instead of a tab crash, the whole browser would crash, and instead of a helpful error, you'd be forced to terminate the process and get some generic Windows error feedback prompt. I suppose that was real hacker culture? Either way, I don't mind cutesy messages so long as they contain at least a code which can be traced back to wherever an exception was thrown or whatever. The main problem is generic error messages which are a problem whether they're cutesy or not ('an error has occurred').
      • jen20 4y ago
        Not at all - real hackers were not using windows obviously!
        • lamontcg 4y ago
  • _jal 4y ago
    I don't need "corporate, uniform, serious, and boring." I generally just want things to be genuine. With error messages, that should be no-nonsense - when software crashes, I'm not interested in how verbally clever the vendor can be. Remember your cutsey expression of your individuality might be cute the first time your software crashes, but after the 100th crash, doesn't come across quite the same way.
  • cgriswald 4y ago
    "Gah," doesn't reflect shame to me, but mild annoyance. Firefox is annoyed that there was a screw up. It doesn't even use "I" language. None of that matters, though. We're looking at this like developers do: From a distance while not being personally affected by it in the moment. The article discusses this point: > What seems fun and light-hearted in your office may read very differently when you’ve just ruined somebody’s day. They use examples of transport, telephony, and finance; all three of which may involve the browser. The author also acknowledges it's okay to be fun: > There’s a place for humour and levity in software, and my code has plenty – but error messages are rarely it.
• tuukkah 4y ago
  I think "your tab" here implies "your loss" not "your fault".
  • lupire 4y ago
    "I'm sorry for your tab."
    • deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    • croisillon 4y ago
      Tab.jpg | || || |_
• tomc1985 4y ago
  Kind of like how Windows' first-time boot-up greets you with a flat (and totally inappropriate) "Hi" Like fucking seriously, not even "Hello"? "Hi" is how I greet the coworker I don't really even like that much. Whenever I see this I think of the Argonian NPCs from Oblivion, who would also greet you with a very flat "Hi" "Greetings," "Salutations," even "Welcome!" would be a better choice here.
  • catlifeonmars 4y ago
    FWIW I don’t think that hi/hello have different connotations of formality. I use both interchangeably.
    • LAC-Tech 4y ago
      For me they definitely do. Hi is much more casual.
      • alistairSH 4y ago
        This. Both are informal greetings, but "hi" is more informal. Mostly interchangeable, but I tend not to use "hello" much - usually either "hi" when passing a peer in the hallway or "good morning/afternoon" if I need to be a bit more formal. FWIW, I was raised in the US, but with Scottish parents, so my speech & vocabulary differ a bit from most Americans.
  • PinkMilkshake 4y ago
    That might be specific to where you are from. I can only speak for Australia and New Zealand, but "Hi" is perfectly acceptable. Unnecessarily formal speech can come across as disingenuous, and maybe a little patronizing. Although the same is true for overly familiar speech as well.
    • checkyoursudo 4y ago
      I say hi in Germany all the time, which even has a formal form of interpersonal communication, and I never even get a second look from anyone. I say hi or hej on purpose because I am trying to teach Germans to be more efficient (some say moin, which is decent). If hi is fine here, then it is certainly fine in any English-speaking country/company. :)
• jagged-chisel 4y ago
  “Gah” reads to me like disappointment. “Gah … that’s the third time this week.”
• chrsig 4y ago
  Honestly, as an engineer "Gah" is generally what I do say. When I experience difficulty with software others create, when I discover frustrations with software I create, and when I discover that a customer experiencing an issue that made it out the door that clearly shouldn't have. It's a very caveman-esque "gah, thinky box no work" type expression, or surprise "gah! wtf just happened!?" Not trying to invalidate what you feel - just trying to share a different perspective. Perhaps a nudge to give the devs the benefit of the doubt that they don't want you to feel bad things when using what they've poured a lot of energy into.
  • mpalmer 4y ago
    I say it too, but I still don't want my software to create the appearance of commiserating with me.
    • bqmjjx0kac 4y ago
      Gah! It looks like you broke your tab. We all feel sad when we make mistakes, but that's why pencils have erasers. Hey, it looks like you're writing a letter.
    • dTal 4y ago
      As a computer professional (I assume), you have a firm understanding of where the text of those messages actually comes from, and that any specific emotional wording can be ignored. Thus, "commiserating" messages feel patronizing. However, to someone for whom computers are mysterious and capricious black boxes which seem to have been put on this Earth solely to test their patience, "friendly" messages may carry tonal information which you take for granted: * You did nothing wrong * This is unintended and regrettable behavior, and we apologize * Nothing is catastrophically broken Consider that your mild irritation with a patronizing message is possibly preferable to some poor grandma hurling her computer out the window because "This program has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down."
      • mpalmer 4y ago
        I worked in tech support for several years; I am fully aware that I am not like most computer users, and that clear, friendly copy makes a difference to non-technical people. Fortunately, there is infinite space to play in between "Gah"/"Well this is awkward!" and "This program has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down."