OMFG! Look at the massive amount of space between the stupid pill shaped tabs - this is the exact opposite of what I want as a tab hoarder! If I wanted to use a shitty safari UI that sacrifices usability for cutesy looks, I would use Safari.
I am still having to use an extension (Sidebery) because Firefox failed to implement vertical tabs half as good. On my MBP, I have two rows of small panel icons to switch between 2 rows of 8 different categories of tabs (16 panels). Below that, I have 3 rows of pinned tabs on each panel (24 pinned tabs). Below that, I can see 24 open tabs without scrolling. That's 48 visible tabs per panel and with a single panel click, I can see a different set of 48 tabs. That makes a total of 768 tabs accessible via a single click. [edit] I should add that I can see 32 characters of the tab title so it is easy to know at a glance what the tab is about. [/edit] Now that is an amazing UI/UX - not some designer pill shaped tabs (that Safari has had for years).
Mozilla: why in the hell do I need to trust some extension builder to give me an amazing UI/UX? Instead of copying Apple's bad decisions - innovate!
p.s. I don't get why in the hell anyone who has more than 10 tabs open at once isn't using vertical tabs? Especially when most monitors have more horizontal pixels than vertical.
Sideberry is GOAT, nothing can beat its flexibility.
I wouldn’t really expect base experience to match what it offers, so as long as Firefox doesn’t break extensions for power users, I am more than happy to see them experimenting with stuff that could help to win back some of the audience.
> so as long as Firefox doesn’t break extensions for power users
You mean, as long as they don't break them any more than they did a few years back? Yes, I'm still salty about that loss.
But to your point, I agree with you. The native Firefox UI hasn't been one I loved for many years, and isn't getting any better. But I am still able to (mostly) massage it into something I'm OK with. As long as I can do that, then I'm fine with them doing whatever they need to do with the default look-and-feel.
They don't need to do anything that they have decided to do. The evidence of this is that nothing they do has led to them not shedding users. In fact, the only thing that gives them a user bump is on the rare occasions that they are allowed not to do exactly what Chrome did, such as V3 and not having AI for 5 seconds before having AI then backing away then moving forward carefully.
Firefox is the browser that intentionally destroys itself. Massaging it into something I want to use involves so many chores and so many extensions (often obsolete and unmaintained, or migrated off the main site onto github or more obscure forges) that I can't recommend it to anyone normie and my attack surface is virtually infinite.
{Adding to my above discussion}
I installed the update on another macbook that's not my daily driver and browser.nova.enabled defaulted to false. Maybe because I have Sidebery? I switched to true and it didn't mess anything up, just added some strange minimal rounding to things. Whew. Keeping it off, but relieved that I can update the SW...
> why in the hell do I need to trust some extension builder to give me an amazing UI/UX?
Because you're a "long tail case" tab user? Your case might be the poster boy for an active extension ecosystem that caters to niche needs.
I don't buy that. I would guess there are plenty of "joe/jane users" that are tab hoarding using horizontal tabs because they don't know better. Since Sidebery already built it, it would be reasonably easy for mozilla to implement a vertical tabs solution that matches its functionality and would seem innovative as hell to joe/jane. Instead, they decide to copy Apple's bad UI/UX.
Setting my browser up the way I did was a serious PITA and it didn't have to be.
It really bugs me that the tabs now look identical to their text input fields. If I go the homepage I see a rounded pill shaped search input field- then above that is the browsers rounded pill shaped address bar input field, and above that a rounded pill shaped tab.
Sidebery user as well for the same reason. I never thought Firefox's design was ugly or that it needed improvements. As long as the sites are rendered properly, there is little to no reason to contemplate browser's design as long as it doesn't actively impede browsing.
>I don't get why in the hell anyone who has more than 10 tabs open at once isn't using vertical tabs?
If it was up to me, I would get Mozilla to hire the author of Tab Mix Plus and to fold that project directly into Firefox.
The only reason why I am running with vertical tabs is because I am running natively-vertical EIZO monitors that are 2k, so I have enough horizontal space to throw up most websites.
anonthrownaway · · focus · HN ↗
I am still having to use an extension (Sidebery) because Firefox failed to implement vertical tabs half as good. On my MBP, I have two rows of small panel icons to switch between 2 rows of 8 different categories of tabs (16 panels). Below that, I have 3 rows of pinned tabs on each panel (24 pinned tabs). Below that, I can see 24 open tabs without scrolling. That's 48 visible tabs per panel and with a single panel click, I can see a different set of 48 tabs. That makes a total of 768 tabs accessible via a single click. [edit] I should add that I can see 32 characters of the tab title so it is easy to know at a glance what the tab is about. [/edit] Now that is an amazing UI/UX - not some designer pill shaped tabs (that Safari has had for years).
Mozilla: why in the hell do I need to trust some extension builder to give me an amazing UI/UX? Instead of copying Apple's bad decisions - innovate!
p.s. I don't get why in the hell anyone who has more than 10 tabs open at once isn't using vertical tabs? Especially when most monitors have more horizontal pixels than vertical.
swed420 · · focus · HN ↗
Because Mozilla is basically owned by Google, neither of them care about you or your UX, and Ladybird isn't ready yet.
vvarp · · focus · HN ↗
I wouldn’t really expect base experience to match what it offers, so as long as Firefox doesn’t break extensions for power users, I am more than happy to see them experimenting with stuff that could help to win back some of the audience.
JohnFen · · focus · HN ↗
You mean, as long as they don't break them any more than they did a few years back? Yes, I'm still salty about that loss.
But to your point, I agree with you. The native Firefox UI hasn't been one I loved for many years, and isn't getting any better. But I am still able to (mostly) massage it into something I'm OK with. As long as I can do that, then I'm fine with them doing whatever they need to do with the default look-and-feel.
pessimizer · · focus · HN ↗
They don't need to do anything that they have decided to do. The evidence of this is that nothing they do has led to them not shedding users. In fact, the only thing that gives them a user bump is on the rare occasions that they are allowed not to do exactly what Chrome did, such as V3 and not having AI for 5 seconds before having AI then backing away then moving forward carefully.
Firefox is the browser that intentionally destroys itself. Massaging it into something I want to use involves so many chores and so many extensions (often obsolete and unmaintained, or migrated off the main site onto github or more obscure forges) that I can't recommend it to anyone normie and my attack surface is virtually infinite.
anonthrownaway · · focus · HN ↗
FeloniousHam · · focus · HN ↗
Because you're a "long tail case" tab user? Your case might be the poster boy for an active extension ecosystem that caters to niche needs.
anonthrownaway · · focus · HN ↗
Setting my browser up the way I did was a serious PITA and it didn't have to be.
laserDinosaur · · focus · HN ↗
thiht · · focus · HN ↗
pllbnk · · focus · HN ↗
rekabis · · focus · HN ↗
If it was up to me, I would get Mozilla to hire the author of Tab Mix Plus and to fold that project directly into Firefox.
The only reason why I am running with vertical tabs is because I am running natively-vertical EIZO monitors that are 2k, so I have enough horizontal space to throw up most websites.