Firefox 2 is now out

[Eroberer]

Originally posted by LordShiva
So how do you select the 11th tab?

Yea. I guess I can't do anything about getting to my 20th tab. Plus Ctrl-# requires a lot more hand gymnastics. Plus, I don't remember the # of the tab. Plus, I generally keep old computer articles that I want to read open as my first couple tabs, and NO, it is not intuitive or less confusing to have to scroll through those to make the Ctrl-Tab function useful in the least.

Regardless, I like the condescending tone from a person who finds a stack form Ctrl-Tab "confusing." That's a great argument!

[Asher]

Originally posted by Solver
That actually documented somewhere, or discovered by digging in the source code ?

http://www.mozilla.org/support/firefox/

Here's the keyboard shortcuts (and their equivalents in IE and Opera): http://www.mozilla.org/support/firefox/keyboard

Another thing most people don't know about is Caret browsing...hit F7 to turn it on. You can then use the keyboard to move a cursor around the screen to select text, navigate links, etc.

[LordShiva]

Oh, I use Ctrl+F for that. (edit: for the quickfind bar)

[Eroberer]

Originally posted by Asher
Eh?

Well, do you know that typing "/" brings up the quickfind bar at the bottom?

So you can type, for instance, "/asher" to quickly find where my name is mentioned.

I did. It's a natural VIM reflex for me. Just like mouse gestures are a natural reflex thanks to Opera, and luckily a very good Firefox extension exists for this.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Eroberer
Yea. I guess I can't do anything about getting to my 20th tab. Plus Ctrl-# requires a lot more hand gymnastics. Plus, I don't remember the # of the tab. Plus, I generally keep old computer articles that I want to read open as my first couple tabs, and NO, it is not intuitive or less confusing to have to scroll through those to make the Ctrl-Tab function useful in the least.

Regardless, I like the condescending tone from a person who finds a stack form Ctrl-Tab "confusing." That's a great argument!

How do you select your 20th tab with a ctrl-tab stack?

It's odd that you talk in terms of ordinals (eg, "20th tab"), but want to use them in an arbitrary fashion.

Stack-based tabs are not intuitive. If I look at the screen and want to select, say, the 4th tab...with a stack-based tab system your keyboard access is not going to be known. You need to CTRL-TAB until you get it, rather than doing it, say, 3 times to get from tab 1 to tab 4.

[Eroberer]

I select the 20th tab with ctrl-tab if it's the next one on the stack. I don't have to remember the number, and I don't have to Ctrl-9 then Ctrl-Shift-Tab backwards (also great hand gymnastics). It'd be easier just to move my hand over the mouse and click on my Apolyton.net tab, than to do Ctrl-9 and Ctrl-Shft-Tab back to my 12th of 18 tabs now in Opera.

How do YOU get to the last tab you JUST used?

A good example: last night I had about 30 tabs open (a lot of old articles included), and I was looking into Google's new Custom Search thing. I had an Ars Technica article open, the Custom Search creator, and the RealClimate.org site open, trying to see what this new thing was all about. To switch between the pages, I used Ctrl-Tab just once or twice to select the page. Now, these tabs were all in the 20's through 30's, not in consecutive order, and I wouldn't really care to figure out how to use the keyboard to get there in Firefox. I'd probably just use the mouse.

Another example: I would have Apolyton, M-W.com, ESPN Polls, Wikipedia, and some College's football schedule open, all to make to my well-informed posts in the College Football thread.

At any given time, I'm only working with a select group of tabs. Opera makes it easier with stack-based Ctrl-Tab.

[Eroberer]

Hey Asher, why does closing a tab in Firefox send you back to the last tab that you used (like in Opera)? Was that a conscious design decision? Does that confuse you, because you'd rather be sent either the first tab, or the last tab and then have to Ctrl-Shift-Tab backwards?

edit: If my memory serves me correctly, this is only the second time in so many years that I've been using Opera, that I've ever had to count how many tabs I have open. (The other was for an online poll.) With that lame Ctrl-# tab selection, it sounds like you do it every day.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Eroberer
I select the 20th tab with ctrl-tab if it's the next one on the stack.

How do you know if it's the next one on the stack? Do the tabs rearrange themselves so this change is visible?

How do YOU get to the last tab you JUST used?

I CTRL-# to it. It's not hard.

At any given time, I'm only working with a select group of tabs. Opera makes it easier with stack-based Ctrl-Tab.

While I admit for how some people use the browser, having a "switch to last tab" feature is useful. But it is pretty wrong as far as interface design goes to implement such a system by default. It relies on hidden heuristics that are not transparent to the users. It's a huge no-no.

Windows' ALT-TAB implementation is similarly frowned upon by UI designers.

CTRL-TAB is meant to tab through the tabs. Such a design is best when it's a left-to-right scrolling through the visual tabs. If you want a stack-based tab history feature, that should be something completely different.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Eroberer
Hey Asher, why does closing a tab in Firefox send you back to the last tab that you used (like in Opera)? Was that a conscious design decision? Does that confuse you, because you'd rather be sent either the first tab, or the last tab and then have to Ctrl-Shift-Tab backwards?

You bring up a good point. Until recently (1.5), this was not the case. It was a big debate whether it should revert to the last tab selected, or the last tab in the list (as 1.0 and prior behaviour was).

Google's use case studies determined that last-tab was the most desirable and intuitive behaviour.

Similarly, Google's use case studies determined that CTRL-TAB is most desirable and intuitive as a keyboard scrolling mechanism for the tabs, not a tab history stack.

edit: If my memory serves me correctly, this is only the second time in so many years that I've been using Opera, that I've ever had to count how many tabs I have open. (The other was for an online poll.) With that lame Ctrl-# tab selection, it sounds like you do it every day.

Maybe I take for granted having arithmetic and general spatial abilities. I usually just CTRL-TAB, knowing how many tabs are between eachother, and knowing this is constant. The stack-based implementation, as in ALT-TAB, annoys the hell out of me because the location of the tab/app I want is always in limbo and never consistent. It's a UI nightmare, and I suspect it's more of a function of your habitual use of it than a good design.

It is a terrible design for several reasons, in recap:
1) The heuristic is not visual or intuitive (if Opera implements a stack-based tab system, the tab order should match this -- they should rearrange themselves to reflect the new tab order)
2) The keyboard shortcuts to reach specific tabs open are not constant and is always changing depending on which tab you last were on. This requires constant user attention (mental maintenance) to keep track of this.

[Asher]

The Firefox engine maintains a tab history stack (as used by the tab-closure feature), but I can't find any Firefox extensions that do that. I don't think people want it.

It should be pretty trivial, considering all it will do is override a function call...

[Eroberer]

If you hit Ctrl-Tab, you can see a list of the tabs in stack order. Plus, I know when I've just switched between Apolyton and ESPN polls, for example. I can build a stack in my head very easily. If I somehow forget this short stack, I can just look at the Ctrl-Tab menu.

I know that UI design Nazis (with whom I agree ~75% of the time) would have a problem with the tabs not rearranging themselves. However, in addition to remember short stacks, I visually remember the position of tabs, where I'll sometimes have Apolyton in 12th of 18 tabs, and I know where to look to click if I need to. I don't want the tabs to switch position. (They switch positions in the Ctrl-Tab menu, though, like I said.)

Opera could have some other key combo do the stack-based tab switching, if you really wanted the "standard" Ctrl-Tab feature, but I'd want to change it back.

Regardless, how do you switch to your 12th of 18 tabs if all you did was open ESPN to see some football rankings? I still think visually counting tabs is slower than committing a short stack to short-term memory.

[Asher]

Here's another strength of Firefox. This extension lets you use CTRL-TAB to use the tab history stack, not the tab order: http://tmp.garyr.net/

Originally posted by Eroberer
(They switch positions in the Ctrl-Tab menu, though, like I said.)

This really does sound like a retarded design. You'd fail a UI design class with that, for sure.

Regardless, how do you switch to your 12th of 18 tabs if all you did was open ESPN to see some football rankings? I still think visually counting tabs is slower than committing a short stack to short-term memory.

You don't even have to count the tabs. You can just guess and then use CTRL-TAB or CTRL-SHIFT-TAB to adjust. IIRC, Opera doesn't even have a CTRL-SHIFT-TAB like functionality to go back one step if you "overshoot" the tab...

The fundamental problem with the stack-based method is it requires active user intervention to build a stack in their head and remember which tab you last visited. This is fine if you're toggling between two tabs, but if you have more than that it's like trying to hit a moving target. Your tab constantly changes its position in the list, and it becomes a frustrating and time-consuming experience to locate your current tab.

Firefox allows users to have it both ways, but I strongly disagree with Opera's default behaviour. It's inconsistent, it's not intuitive (it loses its metaphor of tabs like file folders), and it's hitting a moving target.

[Eroberer]

Originally posted by Asher
The Firefox engine maintains a tab history stack (as used by the tab-closure feature), but I can't find any Firefox extensions that do that. I don't think people want it.

It should be pretty trivial, considering all it will do is override a function call...

That's exactly what I'm considering doing. Firefox's extensibility really takes all my gripes away, and I might actually be willing to do it this time. (edit: That extension you linked to doesn't work with Firefox 2.)

You're right about habitual use, and I'm well aware of the UI Nazi's fear of user "memory" usage, like how I can remember short stacks of information. I can argue that stack-based is faster, but I already imagined that you're very quick with the Firefox way. Do you remember how many Ctrl-Tabs or Ctrl-Shift-Tabs gets you to something? ...Then if you don't remember, you can just look up at the tabs.

Anyway, is there any way to get the Bookmarks Toolbar to display the Bookmark's name below the picture? This was my other gripe the last time I used a version of Firefox, too.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Eroberer
That's exactly what I'm considering doing. Firefox's extensibility really takes all my gripes away, and I might actually be willing to do it this time. (edit: That extension you linked to doesn't work with Firefox 2.)

Try the latest dev build, it should work up through Firefox 3: http://tmp.garyr.net/tab_mix_plus-dev-build.xpi

Do you remember how many Ctrl-Tabs or Ctrl-Shift-Tabs gets you to something? ...Then if you don't remember, you can just look up at the tabs.

A lot of it isn't so much counting but recognizing how fast you're approaching your "destination" tab, if that makes sense. I ctrl-tab-tab-tab..., watching the tabs change very quickly, til I get to my destination. Subconsciously, I remember how many it was so if I want to toggle, I can quickly ctrl-shift-tab back knowing how many times to press tab. You can also drag-and-drop the tabs right next to eachother if you're going to tab between them both a lot.

Anyway, is there any way to get the Bookmarks Toolbar to display the Bookmark's name below the picture? This was my other gripe the last time I used a version of Firefox, too.

I don't think there is a bookmarks toolbar without an extension anymore.

[Eroberer]

The fundamental problem with the stack-based method is it requires active user intervention to build a stack in their head and remember which tab you last visited. This is fine if you're toggling between two tabs, but if you have more than that it's like trying to hit a moving target. Your tab constantly changes its position in the list, and it becomes a frustrating and time-consuming experience to locate your current tab.

It's not that hard. I'd say "active user intervention" also includes looking up at the tabs just to count/guess and Ctrl-Tab to the last tab used. Or memorizing #'s and Ctrl-Tabs. There's less intervention for scrolling through 20 tabs where they're all in use, but more intervention than scrolling through 20 tabs when you're only using 2 to 4, or so.

The Ctrl-Tab menu might fail UI design Nazi classes, but the tabs at the top don't move.

Update: The numbers 1 and 2, in Opera, will scroll in a Firefox type way....forwards and backwards from the current tab. I think this counts as "having it both ways," and I've found--through a very intensive 20 second test--that pressing the number 1 is easier than Ctrl-Shift-Tab (which, in Opera, shifts backwards through the stack starting with the "first used").

edit: The latest Tab Manager installed just fine. It looks pretty good, and it gives me my stack-based Ctrl-Tabbing.