New bookmark icon Nightly feedback

[Ethan Yang]

Hello, I noticed the new nightly the new bookmark icon.  I like the concept of combining the "star" and view "bookmark" icons together, but I think the "bookmark" icon to view bookmarks needs to be enlarged or more prominent than the "star" icon to make bookmarks. 

This is b/c viewing bookmarks is a far more common user action than creating bookmarks, thus it needs to be more prominent and accessible which it was prior to this implementation.  You just need to expand the horizontal size of the view bookmark icon by the 2x or 3x or retain the regular size to solve this .

If we look at the heatmap, the "star" icon is used by 23 percent of users with 1.11 click rate and rises to 1.41 for advanced users.  In contrast the bookmark button is used by 36 percent of users with a click rate of 5.65, that goes all the way up to 8.13 for advanced users.

The current nightly implementation, shrinks the icon and adds the a even bigger "star" or create bookmark icon next to it (less used), which needlessly decreases the margin of error and requires greater precision creating an arbitrary new barrier to one of the most common user actions.  It in fact penalize users by inadvertently creating unsorted bookmarks. 

Just in my informal usage, I have mistakenly created unintended unsorted bookmarks a number of times b/c of how small the "view bookmark" icon is juxtapositioned with the "star" or create bookmark icon. 

Note: I apologize if this email was sent already.  I believe I was able to cancel the post on time.  I am still am not sure how the Firefox dev list really works. 

[Justin Dolske]

On 4/27/13 4:53 AM, Ethan Yang wrote:

> This is b/c viewing bookmarks is a far more common user action than
> creating bookmarks, thus it needs to be more prominent and accessible
> which it was prior to this implementation. You just need to expand the
> horizontal size of the view bookmark icon by the 2x or 3x or retain the
> regular size to solve this .
>

>[...]

>
> The current nightly implementation, shrinks the icon and adds the a even
> bigger "star" or create bookmark icon next to it (less used)

I'm not quite sure what you're talking about. The "star" icon isn't
significantly changing size, it just moves to a a toolbar button. The
right half of the button is a small down-pointing arrow, but that's
fairly standard UI.

OS X screenshot: http://cl.ly/image/3K1o1G3b0m11

Justin

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[Matt Brubeck]

On 4/27/2013 4:10 PM, Justin Dolske wrote:
>> The current nightly implementation, shrinks the icon and adds the a even
>> bigger "star" or create bookmark icon next to it (less used)
>
> I'm not quite sure what you're talking about. The "star" icon isn't
> significantly changing size, it just moves to a a toolbar button. The
> right half of the button is a small down-pointing arrow, but that's
> fairly standard UI.
>
> OS X screenshot: http://cl.ly/image/3K1o1G3b0m11

Previously there were two separate buttons in the toolbar by default:
the "Add Bookmark" star and the "Bookmarks Menu" icon.

Now these have been combined into a single split button.

Ethan pointed out that the "Bookmarks Menu" part of the split button is
much smaller, even though it is a more frequently-used feature. This
seems like a valid complaint.

[Asa Dotzler]

On 4/27/2013 4:37 PM, Matt Brubeck wrote:
> On 4/27/2013 4:10 PM, Justin Dolske wrote:
>>> The current nightly implementation, shrinks the icon and adds the a
>>> even
>>> bigger "star" or create bookmark icon next to it (less used)
>>
>> I'm not quite sure what you're talking about. The "star" icon isn't
>> significantly changing size, it just moves to a a toolbar button. The
>> right half of the button is a small down-pointing arrow, but that's
>> fairly standard UI.
>>
>> OS X screenshot: http://cl.ly/image/3K1o1G3b0m11
>
> Previously there were two separate buttons in the toolbar by default:
> the "Add Bookmark" star and the "Bookmarks Menu" icon.
>
> Now these have been combined into a single split button.
>
> Ethan pointed out that the "Bookmarks Menu" part of the split button
> is much smaller, even though it is a more frequently-used feature.
> This seems like a valid complaint.

Have we validated that assertion? I don't think that holds true today or
would hold true if the star button enjoyed the elevated status of a full
toolbar button rather than being one of many little markers in the
Awesomebar widget.

A year ago it was basically a tie at
https://blog.mozilla.org/ux/files/2012/06/chrome_nomenus.png and I
suspect newer users that have not been encouraged (by it's ready
availability) to use the bookmarks toolbar may be less inclined to "use
bookmarks directly" for getting places (as opposed to relying on the
Awesomebar's elevation of starred items.)

Even if the behavior of our users hasn't changed much, I still think
it's worth challenging the notion that the bookmarks menu button is "a
more frequently-used feature". At best it's an equally used feature.

We need to be careful not to rotate away from our plans because of
random assertions of usage behaviors without data.

- A

[Brandon Cheng]

Asa makes a good point. It would seem like the view bookmarks button is
more used at first, but I don't think that's the case for the majority
of users. I find myself popping open the bookmarks sidebar with a quick
hotkey instead of using the menu. I don't think I've ever used the menu
to open a site.

Additionally, that data is collected from the first year it was
introduced in Firefox 4. It would be fair to say that users discovering
the button's functionality might have added to the statistics.

- Brandon

[Asa Dotzler]

On 4/27/2013 8:27 PM, Ethan Yang wrote:
> With the 2012 study that Aza cited,

It's *Asa*. Thanks.

[Matthew Turnbull]

It's not a far-flung idea that a user is more likely to use an existing
bookmark than they are to create a new one. So it is somewhat odd that
the new UI makes it much easier to create a bookmark then to actually
access and use them.

Numbers would definitely be useful. However, I would imagine that they'd
be as fragmented as the bookmarks UI its self. What with the application
menu, bookmark toolbar, toolbar menu button, star button, side-bar, and
now the combined menu/star button.Given the diversity of the UI,
everyone probably has their own unique way of using it.

For example, I primarily use the bookmark toolbar, Ctrl+D to create
bookmarks, and the star icon only to indicate whether or not the page is
bookmarks. I use CSS to hide the star when the page is not bookmarked,
and removed the toolbar menu. So at least for my personal use, moving
the star out of the location bar has turned it into a waste of space.

All I'm saying is that trying to quantify the affect of this change will
be difficult at best. Some might not notice it, and others might find it
incredibly disruptive. So don't dismiss accessibility and usability
claims simply because there aren't numbers to back it up.

--
Bluefang-Logic Networks:

Scaled for your pleasure.

[Ethan Yang]

For reference, I was using the study https://heatmap.mozillalabs.com/ which what I found through google which is for 2010.  With the 2012 study that Aza cited, it seems that the percentage do not measure frequency of clicks, which I believe would show a higher frequency of clicks per user.  "The heatmap below shows the percentage of users (all OSX, and Windows users with menubar enabled) who clicked on each browser element least once."
-  https://blog.mozilla.org/ux/2012/06/firefox-heatmap-study-2012-results-are-in/

Lets put behind the question of personal relevancy, frequency of use, and other question and just analysis the flaw of the current implementation.  Imagine if you had to fill out a timed Yes or No questionnaire by clicking on was small merged icon with Yes occupying 60 percent and No the rest at 40 percent.  There is no right or wrong answer, but the imbalance needlessly muddles the intent of the user. 

Again, I am not criticizing the decision to merge them as I stated before, what I am criticizing is the size of the bookmark icon.  It is one thing to say a function is no longer it necessary to just take it away.  It is another thing to keep the function, but make it inconvenient by shrinking the icon then juxtaposing a larger icon of different function next creating the possibility of action without intent.  (creating unintended bookmarks)

Just add a few pixels horizontally to the bookmark icon.  Make the "star" and bookmark icon the same length.  Better yet increase both of their length, to minimize any possibilities of unintended actions.  Maybe merged icons should be bigger than regular icons in the first place.   I believe such changes do not compromise Mozilla GUI designer's vision at all, they just make it work as intended. 

[Alex Limi]

On Saturday, April 27, 2013 at 20:27, Ethan Yang wrote:
> Again, I am not criticizing the decision to merge them as I stated before, what I am criticizing is the size of the bookmark icon. It is one thing to say a function is no longer it necessary to just take it away. It is another thing to keep the function, but make it inconvenient by shrinking the icon then juxtaposing a larger icon of different function next creating the possibility of action without intent. (creating unintended bookmarks)

It's an entirely reasonable criticism, and also one that was raised when this design was originally proposed. What has landed right now isn't the final version, so please withhold your judgment and analysis until there is more detail about the new approach.

(Sorry to be so brief and not supply much more detail — I'm not in charge of this, I just know some of what the plans are. It's a Sunday, and I'm sure people from the Firefox UX team will chime in once the work week starts. :)

— Alex Limi · Product Design Strategy, Mozilla · http://twitter.com/limi · http://limi.net

[Ethan Yang]

Thank you for taking it in consideration.  I have been using Firefox since its inception so I witnessed all the changes, but I always just adapted and not really think twice about it.  It also helped that UI has evolved based on sound design.  However, this was first time I felt compelled enough register to the dev list just to specifically give this feedback and I am glad I did. 

Also sorry about the mangling your name Asa, Aza was a former Mozilla employee I believe, and I remember reading his blog posts so that name was ingrained in my mind. 

[Greg Williams]

How will this change to the Bookmark-Star affect Ubuntu users? Presently Ubuntu uses Global Menus (which I like a lot) and the Bookmarks-Icon will not display on the toolbar because users can just use the menu to access bookmarks (which I like better than the bookmark-icon anyway).

Does this change mean Ubuntu users will have to go without the Bookmark-Star altogether?

---

Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2013 22:02:37 -0700
Subject: Re: New bookmark icon Nightly feedback
From: attr...@gmail.com
To: li...@mozilla.com
CC: a...@mozilla.com; firef...@mozilla.org