4 ms·
(I used to work on Chrome.) When we sent the very first Chrome out to reviewers, one reviewer sent back a draft of a review that said Chrome seemed like a nice
by evmar 13y ago
(I used to work on Chrome.)
When we sent the very first Chrome out to reviewers, one reviewer sent back a draft of a review that said Chrome seemed like a nice browser but it had the strange additional feature of popping up ads inside the pages as you browsed.
The reviewer was so accustomed to their existing browser simply blocking pop-ups that it didn't occur to them that the pop-ups were caused by the pages they were visiting, and instead thought it was some Chrome monetization strategy!
Because of this, the feature was scrapped at the last second. There is still some "constrained window" code left over in Chrome that is still used for e.g. HTTP auth prompts. Because the ports came later, I seem to recall we didn't bother with implementing all the draggy window management stuff on Linux and instead centered a dialog over the page content without the window manager controls.
You can search on http://cs.chromium.org http://cs.chromium.org for [constrained_window] to see some of the remaining code.
- jordanthoms 13y agoThis makes me sad... I can remember being excited about this feature from the comics. It seems that case would have been handled by adding popup blocking for automatic popups like chrome has now, and keeping containment for ones which are triggered by clicking a link. Maybe Chrome should just have a (hidden) option to apply the current blocking policy for automatically triggered popups to all popups instead, i.e. they show up in the address bar and you have to click the message to show them. How hard do you think it would be to write a patch for that do you think it'd have a chance of being accepted?
- randall 13y agochromium-dev@chromium.org would be an awesome place to ask that question.
- groby_b 13y agoPlease don't. chromium-dev is about active development work, not about discussing features. chromium-discuss is the place you're looking for.
- evmar 13y agoWith the caveat that I am an engineer and don't make UI decisions, I can guess for you some probabilities. Patches that add hidden options are always rejected. Chrome has hidden options in about:flags but in principle they're all just hiding works in progress that will eventually be permanently on. Patches that add options are rejected 99% of the time. Chrome has a general "no options" policy. (Here is where someone will want to comment about how that policy is dumb and is why they use Opera instead; I don't care, I'm just telling you the facts.) Patches that permanently change the UI in the way you describe might be applied, if they're seen as strictly superior to the way things currently behave. I'm not exactly sure what you're proposing (your description seems to be describing how Chrome currently behaves? not exactly sure how constrained windows relate to that?) but your best bet is to write the patch first and then bring up a discussion of it on the development mailing list. (Writing the patch first prevents your discussion from being a discussion about vaporware.) Sorry if I sound grumpy, I've just seen many feature proposals in my time and I'm hoping to help you not waste your time. :)
- dsl 13y agoThat policy is dumb and that is why I use Opera instead!
- ryguytilidie 13y agoHe doesn't care, he's just telling you the facts.
- yew 13y agoIn all seriousness though: Google does things their own way, and that's fine. But design policies (policies in general) tend to migrate between business domains. Pointing out that you're personally not a fan of some particular policy (provided you do so politely and don't belabor the point) can be informative for incidental third parties as well as for the people currently writing the rules. I know I for one appreciate it, for the same reason I appreciate Google's public programming style guides.
- 13y ago
- modeless 13y agoYou don't need a hidden option or patch for that, there are several extensions that work well: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/search/popup%20blocker https://chrome.google.com/webstore/search/popup%20blocker
- coldtea 13y agoI'd rather have a central, native, supported way to block popups, than trust some arbitrary third party JS code that has to run on every bloody page, and look at all my content.
- jordanthoms 13y agoI've tried many of them, and they of them cause major breakage on lots of sites.
- majani 13y agoI find it hard to believe that Google made a major feature decision based on one person's feedback.
- RexRollman 13y agoIt was Larry Page.
- nhebb 13y ago> The reviewer was so accustomed to their existing browser simply blocking pop-ups Why didn't Chrome simply block the popups as well? (NB: I switched back to Firefox a year ago, so I don't know if popups are still a problem in Chrome.)
- jonknee 13y agoChrome does block popups and doesn't have problems doing so, it's just that what's described by the OP and the link is a different way of displaying popups. It was apparently confusing to the reviewer and never did ship.
- nhebb 13y agoUnfortunately, that wasn't my experience. I even tried the Better Popup Blocker extension, and I would still get them (especially from Netflix).
- jordanthoms 13y agoAre those scammy popups actually netflix, or people using the affiliate program?
- k3n 13y agoIt's actually terrible about it, an addon is required and even those aren't fool-proof.