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I've tried Arc and have since reverted back to Firefox. It has a bunch of features I like, but one huge drawback that kind of kills it for me. Arc gives you per

I've tried Arc and have since reverted back to Firefox. It has a bunch of features I like, but one huge drawback that kind of kills it for me. Arc gives you persistent tabs across all open windows, and you wind up with (whether you want to or not) numerous open windows. That means I have to sift through 5+ open windows of identical tabs just to find the one window with the tab containing the Reddit comment I was in the middle of writing. It ends up being more hassle than it's worth. Most of us use multiple windows to divide up separate, short-term pieces of work that we don't really need to persist very long, and Arc just doesn't deal with this scenario well at all. I think the only solution would be to somehow sync the state of all tabs across all windows (so my half-written Reddit comment appears in the same Reddit tab in every window).

drc500free 3y ago
It deals with that through having multiple "spaces" - horizontal scroll on the tabs to get to another one that can have completely different tabs for a different context. But they haven't smoothed out the UX with multiple windows, which has all the annoyances that you point out. I think they need to figure out how to nudge users towards going to a different space instead of a new window, or automatically launch each new window with a new space.
- EnragedParrot 3y ago
  I think it's more than just shifting users from thinking in windows to thinking in spaces - the problem is fundamentally that spaces don't fill the use-case of a separate window. A space is a permanent place for a collection of tabs, I think they even enable separate logins. To "destroy" a space requires the user going through a series of actions (right click > delete space > confirm deletion). I use windows as a temporary collection of related things. If I'm researching a purchasing decision, for instance, I'll have a tab with the Amazon listing and a bunch of tabs containing information/reviews about the item. But I only need that for a couple hours, then I want to easily dump everything by closing that window. And I want to be able to easily find just my research info by scanning my open windows. Spaces are too permanent for that use case. Another way to say that is that Spaces need their own windows sometimes, too, and Arc deals with that scenario way worse than a traditional browser. They need some "in-between" solution if they don't want users needing multiple windows, or they need to handle multiple windows better.
bit_bear 3y ago
“Most of us use multiple windows to divide up separate, short-term pieces of work that we don't really need to persist very long,” Thats when you open up a little arc.
basisword 3y ago
>> Most of us use multiple windows to divide up separate, short-term pieces of work that we don't really need to persist very long I think that’s a big assumption.

drc500free 3y ago

It deals with that through having multiple "spaces" - horizontal scroll on the tabs to get to another one that can have completely different tabs for a different context. But they haven't smoothed out the UX with multiple windows, which has all the annoyances that you point out. I think they need to figure out how to nudge users towards going to a different space instead of a new window, or automatically launch each new window with a new space.

EnragedParrot 3y ago
I think it's more than just shifting users from thinking in windows to thinking in spaces - the problem is fundamentally that spaces don't fill the use-case of a separate window. A space is a permanent place for a collection of tabs, I think they even enable separate logins. To "destroy" a space requires the user going through a series of actions (right click > delete space > confirm deletion). I use windows as a temporary collection of related things. If I'm researching a purchasing decision, for instance, I'll have a tab with the Amazon listing and a bunch of tabs containing information/reviews about the item. But I only need that for a couple hours, then I want to easily dump everything by closing that window. And I want to be able to easily find just my research info by scanning my open windows. Spaces are too permanent for that use case. Another way to say that is that Spaces need their own windows sometimes, too, and Arc deals with that scenario way worse than a traditional browser. They need some "in-between" solution if they don't want users needing multiple windows, or they need to handle multiple windows better.

bit_bear 3y ago

“Most of us use multiple windows to divide up separate, short-term pieces of work that we don't really need to persist very long,” Thats when you open up a little arc.

basisword 3y ago

>> Most of us use multiple windows to divide up separate, short-term pieces of work that we don't really need to persist very long I think that’s a big assumption.