3.7 alpha 4 - Vista and Aero
John Bird
effects on Vista/Windows 7 - I am on Vista and see no change, is there a
setting to tweak? (I do have one simple persona installed - does that need
to be deleted?)
John Bird
Shawn Wilsher
last night's nightly to see it if you really want to.
Cheers,
Shawn
John Bird
I have been agitating here on and off for a long time for ability to find
open tabs - going right back when the awesome first appeared - it seemed
such a illogical omission. I had almost got the impression no-one else was
listening. I really really need this. Currently have 68 tabs open, and
thats because I have been cleaning up - I often have 130 or more.
My suggestions of how it should work - make it similar to current awesome
bar:
-Current Shows Title and URL (underneath), and on the right either blank,
or a star if its a bookmark.
-So just do the same, and put some kind of tab icon instead of the star.
-If there is a tab open, and a bookmark, in most cases the simplest thing is
to show both. Selecting bookmark opens in current tab, selecting tab can
have a note beside it (as in Asa's mockup) "switch to" and thats what it
does.
Reason this is simple - if people see there are more matches then they will
just type a little more to narrow the list down, or its really simple to
figure out what each entry is. Especially if there is a small note next to
a tab entry saying "switch to this tab"
That would be just wonderful.
Note - the only reason I stopped complaining was I found a perfect extension
that does this beautifully - Tab Hunter - which is slickly designed, works
lightning fast, does just this and no more, and is compatible with latest
nightlies too (unlike many such as Firebug).
John Bird
Blair McBride
And a blog post is on my to-do list, to make people more aware of it.
- Blair
(a fellow Kiwi)
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David McRitchie
> I saw a news article today saying the latest nightly should show aero glass
> effects on Vista/Windows 7 - I am on Vista and see no change, is there a
> setting to tweak? (I do have one simple persona installed - does that need
Well I've seen effects of Windows 7 in Firefox since I first tried Windows 7 in
December. Aero glass is not in Vista, so I guess that is the answer to your
question.
For those that have Windows 7, the latest changes to Firefox 3.7 beta have
made Firefox impossible for me use use without changes. I already got rid
of Windows 7 effects http://www.mvps.org/dmcritchie/windows-7/win7.htm
but had to go one step further now for with change in Minefield 3.7a4pre as
seen in my comments in
Color Toolbar(s) to identify profile (DM*) | userstyles.org
http://userstyles.org/styles/9514
Even with these changes I get black backgrounds on icons from menu
drop-downs and some impossible read options in some dialogs where some
of the options wording are completely blacked out such as in Stylish
options.
So do these changes affect Internet Explorer as well, yes, but Microsoft
is not messing up the toolbars in IE, only the titlebar. When Mozilla
tries to copy another browser they never really even do what they say
they are doing. The worst thing is that only the graphics designers
at Mozilla like such such changes, Firefox users sure don't.
Shawn Wilsher
> Well I've seen effects of Windows 7 in Firefox since I first tried
> Windows 7 in
> December. Aero glass is not in Vista, so I guess that is the answer to your
> question.
> Even with these changes I get black backgrounds on icons from menu
> drop-downs and some impossible read options in some dialogs where some
> of the options wording are completely blacked out such as in Stylish
> options.
So, if I understand you correctly, you are upset that a product that is
named "Minefield" and is "provided without any guarantees of stability
and you should back up your profile regularly as there may be bugs that
corrupt your data" [2] has a few bugs?
> So do these changes affect Internet Explorer as well, yes, but Microsoft
> is not messing up the toolbars in IE, only the titlebar. When Mozilla
> tries to copy another browser they never really even do what they say
> they are doing. The worst thing is that only the graphics designers
> at Mozilla like such such changes, Firefox users sure don't.
I'm sure your discounting of users of add-ons like Glasser or Strata40
was merely any oversight.
Cheers,
Shawn
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Aero
[2] http://www.mozilla.org/projects/minefield/
Peter Lairo
Are you implying that a *significant* number of Firefox users use those
add-ons?
I too am very skeptical of the practical use of having the UI "washed
out" by the translucent aero-glass background.
--
Regards,
Peter Lairo
Bugs I think should be fixed ASAP:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=250539
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=391057
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=436259
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=446444
https://www.mozdev.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=22003
Islam: http://www.jihadwatch.org/islam101/
Israel: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths2/
Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster: http://www.venganza.org/
Anthropogenic Global Warming skepsis: http://tinyurl.com/AGW-Skepsis
Shawn Wilsher
> Are you implying that a *significant* number of Firefox users use those
> add-ons?
backing it up. Strata40 has almost 86,000 active daily users [1] and
300 reviews with a five star rating.. Glasser does not disclose its
usage statistics, but it does have 281 reviews with a five star rating.
Additionally, the feedback on the UX blogs has been generally positive
towards the change.
Cheers,
Shawn
Alex Faaborg
> I too am very skeptical of the practical use of having the UI "washed out"
> by the translucent aero-glass background.
>
The current plans don't actually call for much UI to be directly placed on
glass in the default configuration. Even with the toolbars reordered so
that glass is being applied to the navigation toolbar, there aren't that
many visual elements placed directly on glass (back/forward, location bar,
search bar).
As we land things incrementally sometimes stuff can feel a bit strange
(right now reload, stop and home do feel a bit washed out by the glass
background). But it's best to at least debate the pros and cons of the
intended end state as opposed to the current intermediary state.
-Alex
Peter Lairo
>> I too am very skeptical of the practical use of having the UI "washed out"
>> by the translucent aero-glass background.
>
> The current plans don't actually call for much UI to be directly placed on
> glass in the default configuration. Even with the toolbars reordered so
> that glass is being applied to the navigation toolbar, there aren't that
> many visual elements placed directly on glass (back/forward, location bar,
> search bar).
Really? Are you referring to these "current plans" here:
https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox/4.0_Windows_Theme_Mockups#Large_Button_Mode_with_Bookmarks_Bar_2
If my preferred layout is chosen (i.e. tabs-on-bottom, Bookmarks Toolbar
showing, page title in the Title Area - See: "Large Button Mode with
Bookmarks Bar") then it seems almost all UI will be on glass. :-\
PS. Things that would suck:
- Tabs-on-top (away from the web page)
- No page title in the Title Area (long titles not readable,
no consistent location)
- Bookmarks Toolbar on aero glass (hard to read)
- Background tabs on aero glass (hard to read)
Summary: aesthetics over and separated from usability
Alex Faaborg
strip (was only thinking about glass applying to the navigation toolbar).
We'll have to look at feedback from the nightly builds and play around with
it for awhile to get a sense of if that is what we want to do. Sorry about
the confusion in my reply.
-Alex
Jesper Kristensen
> Right, the proposal for alpha blending on the bookmarks toolbar and tab
> strip (was only thinking about glass applying to the navigation toolbar).
> We'll have to look at feedback from the nightly builds and play around with
> it for awhile to get a sense of if that is what we want to do. Sorry about
> the confusion in my reply.
> -Alex
>
I think it would be better to not use a glass effect on the tabs and
bookmarks toolbar in that particular case. I think the main benefit of
using glass is to remove a line between your controls and the window
border, thereby reducing visual complexity. In this case there is a line
added anyway, so the benefits disappear, and having text on glass is not
nice. This particular mockup reminds me of the "incorrect" example on
this page: http://msdn.microsoft.com/da-dk/aa974173%28en-us%29.aspx#glass
Peter Lairo
> I think it would be better to not use a glass effect on the tabs and
> bookmarks toolbar in that particular case. I think the main benefit of
> using glass is to remove a line between your controls and the window
> border, thereby reducing visual complexity. In this case there is a line
> added anyway, so the benefits disappear, and having text on glass is not
> nice. This particular mockup reminds me of the "incorrect" example on
> this page: http://msdn.microsoft.com/da-dk/aa974173%28en-us%29.aspx#glass
Yes, the proposed "Firefox" button would fall into the "incorrect"
example on that page (about half way down).
"Don't add controls to a window frame. Put the controls
within the window instead."
Another quote from there (at top) that struck me was:
"With a window frame, users can manipulate a window and
*view the title* and icon to identify its contents."
I hope Mozilla will keep the *title* in the window frame (aka *title* bar).
Peter Lairo
>> This particular mockup reminds me of the "incorrect" example on
>> this page: http://msdn.microsoft.com/da-dk/aa974173%28en-us%29.aspx#glass
>
> Yes, the proposed "Firefox" button would fall into the "incorrect"
> example on that page (about half way down).
>
> "Don't add controls to a window frame. Put the controls
> within the window instead."
>
> Another quote from there (at top) that struck me was:
>
> "With a window frame, users can manipulate a window and
> *view the title* and icon to identify its contents."
>
> I hope Mozilla will keep the *title* in the window frame (aka *title* bar).
Oh, another important quote on that page (under chapter "Glass"):
"Consider using glass strategically in small regions
touching the window frame _without text_."
Without text!!! So the boobmarks bar and background tabs should *not* be
glass.
(did you notice my Freudian slip in that previous paragraph?)
PS. I'm against tabs-on-top and omitting the title in the title bar.