Everyone can now track down noisy tabs(chrome.blogspot.com)
chrome.blogspot.com
Everyone can now track down noisy tabs
http://chrome.blogspot.com/2014/01/everyone-can-now-track-down-noisy-tabs.html
20 comments
Same here. I didn't realize tabs playing music was such a rampant problem that needed to be addressed. The supervised users feature has a lot of appeal to me as well. My kids' computer (Mac Mini) has Chrome set as the default browser. I'll need to look into this more closely.
>Same here. I didn't realize tabs playing music was such a rampant problem
It is actually a problem I've wanted a fix for since, I don't know, maybe Phoenix .9 or whatever first introduced me to tabbed browsing in the world. this is a huge feature. I suspect the other browsers will try to follow too, if they aren't already in their dev/bleedingedge repos.
It is actually a problem I've wanted a fix for since, I don't know, maybe Phoenix .9 or whatever first introduced me to tabbed browsing in the world. this is a huge feature. I suspect the other browsers will try to follow too, if they aren't already in their dev/bleedingedge repos.
I'm curious how many times a day you run into an issue of having a tab play sounds and you can't figure out which one it is.
To me it doesn't happen often, but when it does, it's a huge annoyance. Basically it stops you dead in your tracks of whatever you were doing and sends you on a frantic hunt for what tab is causing it. The usefulness of a feature that solves problem is (n times p happens * annoyance of p) - at least that's how I prioritize features. So yeah - I've searched several times a year for a plugin that does this, for at least 5 years back.
This is a poor way to assess the value of a feature. How many times a day do you use your windshield wipers?
I wasn't using it to asses the value of the feature in general. I was just curious how often that user ran into the problem that makes it a problem they have been trying to find a fix for since the beginning of tabbed browsing. A tiny annoyance that happens 10 times a day, everyday? A huge annoyance that has happened only twice... but just got him fired from his job? This person made it sound pretty serious to them so I was trying to get a better understanding of what they thought was serious. The issue is so not serious to me that it is not even an issue. Not wanting to sit with just a sample of 1, I thought I'd try to get additional info.
But since you asked... there have been many times when I used my wipers thousands of times each day for several days on end. But we're experiencing a bit of a drought right now so I've not used them in a couple months.
But since you asked... there have been many times when I used my wipers thousands of times each day for several days on end. But we're experiencing a bit of a drought right now so I've not used them in a couple months.
Some people on HN open very many tabs. Like, over one hundred open tabs. So I guess those people find it hard to find the noisy tab.
Also, some things are kind of frustrating, but not frustrating enough to bother spending ages fixing it.
Quite often something will happen and I'll think "there must be a fix. I just don't know the OS enough yet" - and sometimes there is a really easy fix and sometimes there is an ugly 3rd party kludge. While the problem is kind of annoying having a fix just fixes the problem, while searching for a fix teaches me more. (Am I making any sense? Its about the journey not the destination).
Also, some things are kind of frustrating, but not frustrating enough to bother spending ages fixing it.
Quite often something will happen and I'll think "there must be a fix. I just don't know the OS enough yet" - and sometimes there is a really easy fix and sometimes there is an ugly 3rd party kludge. While the problem is kind of annoying having a fix just fixes the problem, while searching for a fix teaches me more. (Am I making any sense? Its about the journey not the destination).
> Some people on HN open very many tabs. Like, over one hundred open tabs.
I can't even imagine how that is useful. I guess it is to them or they wouldn't do it.
I can't even imagine how that is useful. I guess it is to them or they wouldn't do it.
I have 25 tabs open at the moment (and I've only had this browser open for 3 hours).
I tend to "open in new tab" and queue things for reading.
Because I tend to open lots of new tabs within a short period, it makes identifying the one that is playing sounds very hard. The worst is the "delayed video player" scenario, especially if it is below the fold. It's incredibly annoying and embarrassing to be desperately trying to find where the noise is coming from if it happens in a boring meeting.
I tend to "open in new tab" and queue things for reading.
Because I tend to open lots of new tabs within a short period, it makes identifying the one that is playing sounds very hard. The worst is the "delayed video player" scenario, especially if it is below the fold. It's incredibly annoying and embarrassing to be desperately trying to find where the noise is coming from if it happens in a boring meeting.
I can get to 50 tabs pretty quickly when researching a problem. Sometimes I'll then trim them and save them as sets to open later. Is really useful for cross referencing and noun hunting.
What do you use to save them?
The browser.
On firefox is just Bookmarks > Bookmark All Tabs
On firefox is just Bookmarks > Bookmark All Tabs
My wife can literally have 30 tabs open at once. It doesn't make sense to me...
I've probably got about 60 open across two sessions right now, and this is typical or lower. It's as simple as having a queue of things to get to, plus groups of tabs represented in-progress research on some topic. It's especially useful given tab-sync across devices. It's not a workflow for everyone, but if the benefit of having easy access outweighs the intangible mental cost of a zillion tabs, it can work very well.
I like to open multiple youtube tabs at the same time and then watch videos one by one. Most of them are in flash and I have flash block, so they do not play until I actually click on them.
Some youtube videos are not blocked by flashblock and it is highly annoying when two videos play at the same time.
Some new site use autoplay videos too, and again, I like to open multiple tabs and then close them at the same time. Of course I can figure out which tab is causing it, but it is annoying having to do it. With this feature, I can just kill it.
Some youtube videos are not blocked by flashblock and it is highly annoying when two videos play at the same time.
Some new site use autoplay videos too, and again, I like to open multiple tabs and then close them at the same time. Of course I can figure out which tab is causing it, but it is annoying having to do it. With this feature, I can just kill it.
It happened to me once today with a streaming radio station. Strangely, I had hit the back button, so there was no player visible on the page, yet it began playing after a minute or two of dead air. I couldn't find it for a while (there were no players visible on any of the tabs I had recently opened), and I ended up having to click the tab, then click the "forward" button to go to a page I didn't seem to be on, then click the "pause" button on the player. I was lucky I figured it out, because I have a lot of tabs open. If I'd had an icon on the tab, I would have just closed the tab.
And yesterday, it happened on a news page. The page autoplayed a video, which always bugged me. I looked around the page, found the annoying little video, and stopped it. About twenty minutes later, my laptop suddenly started talking. It took a minute or so to figure out that the page that had autoplayed earlier had a 20 minute refresh cycle, and each refresh restarts the autoplay. Once I identified the tab, I closed it.
So I'd like to see 1) an easier way to identify where the sound is coming from (such as these tab icons) and 2) a "don't autoplay" preference.
And yesterday, it happened on a news page. The page autoplayed a video, which always bugged me. I looked around the page, found the annoying little video, and stopped it. About twenty minutes later, my laptop suddenly started talking. It took a minute or so to figure out that the page that had autoplayed earlier had a 20 minute refresh cycle, and each refresh restarts the autoplay. Once I identified the tab, I closed it.
So I'd like to see 1) an easier way to identify where the sound is coming from (such as these tab icons) and 2) a "don't autoplay" preference.
I ran into it yesterday. Not even kidding. I had maybe 12 tabs open and one tab started making a pay-attention-to-me notification sound that I didn't recognize, so I had to go through all the tabs looking for what wanted my attention.
I have this problem about once a day. It's usually a flash advert or other such nonsense.
Flashblock and Adblock are useful for preventing this.
Unfortunately, I don't know how to stop HTML5 videos from auto-playing.
Unfortunately, I don't know how to stop HTML5 videos from auto-playing.
In Firefox, the "media.autoplay.enabled" pref can be used to disable the "autoplay" attribute for the <video> element. (But I think it may still be possible for pages to auto-start videos using JavaScript.)
Fortunately, with Adblock Plus and FlashBlock, it's fairly rare.
The most common culprit lately has been YouTube with HTML5 supported videos and autoplay, which I fucking despise. My immediate reaction is to close tabs.
My MO with browsing generally is to queue material up for review later. Crap that demands my attention usually gets it by way of a fist.
Any other domain which commits the same or similar crimes either gets the offending page element removed via Stylebot, or AdBlock's element blocker, or with an /etc/hosts file 0.0.0.0 entry. Life's too fucking short for that shit.
The most common culprit lately has been YouTube with HTML5 supported videos and autoplay, which I fucking despise. My immediate reaction is to close tabs.
My MO with browsing generally is to queue material up for review later. Crap that demands my attention usually gets it by way of a fist.
Any other domain which commits the same or similar crimes either gets the offending page element removed via Stylebot, or AdBlock's element blocker, or with an /etc/hosts file 0.0.0.0 entry. Life's too fucking short for that shit.
Another use case is that if you start up a music player, a video, or click on an embedded video on Facebook, and then tab away from it. If you didn't pin it, it can be hard to find it again.
It happens to me fairly regularly browsing Reddit because I'll open a bunch of things at once and then read them as I tab through.
Maybe 3-4 times a day.
Initially, I also wondered how many people have the noise problem. So far, the only way I managed to maneuver myself into that situation in Firefox is by having a few hundred tabs open (enough to make FF become sluggish and unresponsive) and then clicking around too much in an unresponsive interval. In that situation, I'd end up with some tabs, unknown to me, that I had accidentally clicked, which then start playing youtube videos.
There might, however, be more exposure to this problem for people who don't use adblockplus and noscript. I'm just not sure how. You'd open a bunch of tabs and then a few seconds later one of them would start blabbing?
There might, however, be more exposure to this problem for people who don't use adblockplus and noscript. I'm just not sure how. You'd open a bunch of tabs and then a few seconds later one of them would start blabbing?
It's almost entirely due to ads, and this exact problem drove me to using adblock after years of avoiding it. Sometimes it just happens in the background at random, and sometimes it happens when loading bookmark groups.
It's not really a sufficient solution for me. I'd prefer to explicitly allow tabs to play sound. I believe Firefox experimented with that approach and found users didn't like it, though.
It's not really a sufficient solution for me. I'd prefer to explicitly allow tabs to play sound. I believe Firefox experimented with that approach and found users didn't like it, though.
There's been a number of ads and things on pages like cnn.com that'll start playing something to make noise, while being below the fold just so you'll have to go looking for it to stop it. I've seen it go in and out in cycles depending on the page and what you view.
I guess I just don't use my browser the same way. I don't typically have more than 15-20 tabs open but I very rarely have a tab open that I'm unaware of. I must also manage to avoid all the annoying sites that use ads that play automatically. I don't use adblock or noscript and I think I can count on one hand the number of times I've had an ad play on its own. And it was always pretty easy to spot and rectify.
I wonder how many tabs you can open before the tabs become too narrow and this new speaker icon goes away. Or maybe it would take the place of the favicon on a really narrow tab.
I wonder how many tabs you can open before the tabs become too narrow and this new speaker icon goes away. Or maybe it would take the place of the favicon on a really narrow tab.
>I wonder how many tabs you can open before the tabs become too narrow and this new speaker icon goes away. Or maybe it would take the place of the favicon on a really narrow tab.
I just experimented with the beta and found that as the tabs narrow, it over time does change prioritization between the favicon, title, and audio indicator. On my 15" Mac Book Pro, once I hit about 40 tabs in one window I can no longer see the audio indicators.
I think Chrome will need to show the user an overview of audio indicators (similar to what I attempted to do in my MuteTab Chrome extension.) You can get some information at chrome://media-internals but 1) that isn't user facing and 2) it doesn't let you perform commands. I would have to guess the reason this hasn't happened is because Chrome works really hard to provide users with a minimal interface; perhaps they could provide an audio API and let people who care about this install an extension?
I just experimented with the beta and found that as the tabs narrow, it over time does change prioritization between the favicon, title, and audio indicator. On my 15" Mac Book Pro, once I hit about 40 tabs in one window I can no longer see the audio indicators.
I think Chrome will need to show the user an overview of audio indicators (similar to what I attempted to do in my MuteTab Chrome extension.) You can get some information at chrome://media-internals but 1) that isn't user facing and 2) it doesn't let you perform commands. I would have to guess the reason this hasn't happened is because Chrome works really hard to provide users with a minimal interface; perhaps they could provide an audio API and let people who care about this install an extension?
The thing that springs to mind relating relating to the music problem is: tumblr blogs. I've been a few times in a situation that I opened a tumblr blog (fandom blog) to read some news about a TV show, just to forget about the tab later. It sometimes takes a few minutes for the files to download (not sure why either, maybe there is an artificial delay added) and they start playing randomly, and then you're left wondering what the hell is happening. Granted, it happened only once or twice.
Supervised users are definitely awesome for kids, but I'm also planning to try it out as a replacement for my current /etc/hosts hack for keeping away from time-sucking sites.
Echoes with all parents for sure
Not all. As a kid, I was taught that information wasn't dangerous.
There's shit I got into as a kid--horror movies, torture accounts--that gave me nightmares for weeks. My parents did their best to guide me away from stuff like that until I was older, and they were right to do so--I had enough trouble sleeping as it was. When they failed, they helped me talk about it and deal with it.
Your shallow sanctimony excludes a gigantic middle between "let your kids do whatever they want" and "keep your kids in a padded room lined with Bible verses."
Your shallow sanctimony excludes a gigantic middle between "let your kids do whatever they want" and "keep your kids in a padded room lined with Bible verses."
>There's shit I got into as a kid--horror movies, torture accounts--that gave me nightmares for weeks
So what?
"Kid does something, figures out it was a bad idea" isn't a tragedy. Definitely doesn't rise to the level of justifying censorship. It's being a kid. It's learning.
Seriously, human beings are going to choose (partially) negative experiences sometimes and you should let them. It's part of being a person. Use of (physical|emotional|technological) force to prevent this is both disturbing and ultimately futile.
Warnings are one thing, but you still have the right to ignore them and find out for yourself why they were given.
So what?
"Kid does something, figures out it was a bad idea" isn't a tragedy. Definitely doesn't rise to the level of justifying censorship. It's being a kid. It's learning.
Seriously, human beings are going to choose (partially) negative experiences sometimes and you should let them. It's part of being a person. Use of (physical|emotional|technological) force to prevent this is both disturbing and ultimately futile.
Warnings are one thing, but you still have the right to ignore them and find out for yourself why they were given.
> Seriously, human beings are going to choose (partially) negative experiences sometimes and you should let them. It's part of being a person. Use of (physical|emotional|technological) force to prevent this is both disturbing and ultimately futile.
O.o
Have you, like, seen children? My roommate's one-year-old regularly chooses to throw himself headfirst off the couch. She uses physical force to prevent him. Disturbing and futile, apparently!
Or, if we assume an exception for physical injury, I would certainly have chosen to spend my childhood indoors playing video games if my parents hadn't used emotional force to get me to go to school. I suppose you can try to derail onto the failings of public education if you like, but I wasn't interested in alternative education either; I just wanted to play video games, which would probably have resulted in me still living at home at 35 instead of having a degree and a satisfying, well-paying job. Clearly they should have just "warned" me that I was going to ruin my entire life, then stood aside and let me learn, eh?
O.o
Have you, like, seen children? My roommate's one-year-old regularly chooses to throw himself headfirst off the couch. She uses physical force to prevent him. Disturbing and futile, apparently!
Or, if we assume an exception for physical injury, I would certainly have chosen to spend my childhood indoors playing video games if my parents hadn't used emotional force to get me to go to school. I suppose you can try to derail onto the failings of public education if you like, but I wasn't interested in alternative education either; I just wanted to play video games, which would probably have resulted in me still living at home at 35 instead of having a degree and a satisfying, well-paying job. Clearly they should have just "warned" me that I was going to ruin my entire life, then stood aside and let me learn, eh?
As a parent, I have learned that not every mind at every age is equipped to process every bit of information out there without some guidance. Misinformation can be dangerous. Information out of context can be dangerous. Information in ill-prepared hands can be dangerous. The word is mightier than the sword - Ahiqar
The feature is called "supervised users" not "locked in a tower users". So information can flow however the supervisor wishes. It could be simply a "monitor & discuss" role where seeing the user's browser history gives the supervisor information about what the user has been reading and they initiate a conversation about it. It doesn't have to lead to blocking and restriction. It can be another tool for parents to use to teach their children.
The feature is called "supervised users" not "locked in a tower users". So information can flow however the supervisor wishes. It could be simply a "monitor & discuss" role where seeing the user's browser history gives the supervisor information about what the user has been reading and they initiate a conversation about it. It doesn't have to lead to blocking and restriction. It can be another tool for parents to use to teach their children.
> where seeing the user's browser history gives the supervisor information about what the user has been reading and they initiate a conversation about it.
Surveillance has a chilling effect and parent-child surveillance is no different.
If I had to do this, I would have just avoided the internet as much as possible. I suspect most kids beyond age 9/10 are roughly the same.
I would never have learned to program, never have started reading HN, never have browsed Wikipedia except for specific queries. I would never have acquired the information or communication and technical skills I currently possess. I'd be a completely different and vastly inferior person looking at a much less interesting future.
> It doesn't have to lead to blocking and restriction
"Monitor and supervise" is orders of magnitude worse than content filtering. This approach forces children to block themselves from having any sort of individual experience. If your child is even slightly introverted and is old enough not to not want to share every second with you, "monitor and supervise internet activity" is equal to "learn about and engage with the world around you as little as possible." It sends a message that by default, information is bad - any time you do seek information, you know you'll have to justify your curiosity. This doesn't just apply to objectionable content, it applies to everything.
I was happy to show my parents my finished projects and even wrote a few specifically for family. If I were getting interrogated, incompetently, about every intermediate step ("Why did you install django-south? What's a database? What's a schema? What's a query? What's a function? Oh, is that like a ___? No, mom, go away.") I would have just watched mindless TV instead.
Could you imagine knowing that you will have to discuss every link you follow and every Google search you enter with anyone, let alone your parents? That's horrifying.
Surveillance has a chilling effect and parent-child surveillance is no different.
If I had to do this, I would have just avoided the internet as much as possible. I suspect most kids beyond age 9/10 are roughly the same.
I would never have learned to program, never have started reading HN, never have browsed Wikipedia except for specific queries. I would never have acquired the information or communication and technical skills I currently possess. I'd be a completely different and vastly inferior person looking at a much less interesting future.
> It doesn't have to lead to blocking and restriction
"Monitor and supervise" is orders of magnitude worse than content filtering. This approach forces children to block themselves from having any sort of individual experience. If your child is even slightly introverted and is old enough not to not want to share every second with you, "monitor and supervise internet activity" is equal to "learn about and engage with the world around you as little as possible." It sends a message that by default, information is bad - any time you do seek information, you know you'll have to justify your curiosity. This doesn't just apply to objectionable content, it applies to everything.
I was happy to show my parents my finished projects and even wrote a few specifically for family. If I were getting interrogated, incompetently, about every intermediate step ("Why did you install django-south? What's a database? What's a schema? What's a query? What's a function? Oh, is that like a ___? No, mom, go away.") I would have just watched mindless TV instead.
Could you imagine knowing that you will have to discuss every link you follow and every Google search you enter with anyone, let alone your parents? That's horrifying.
Why do you think that you would have to explain to your parents every single link you visit? Surely parents will use their discretion, just as they do with every other decision their child makes.
There is a difference between the government-citizen surveillance and parent-child surveillance.
There is a difference between the government-citizen surveillance and parent-child surveillance.
The analogy between the spying government and the spying parent is a good one, and I am interested to hear how you say that it's different.
In both cases, a figure of authority (legitimate authority!) spys on you, pro[poradly for your own good. (Maybe even really for your own good! Just because the NSA's spying hasn't actually successfully foiled any terrorist plots yet doesn't mean that all spying programs of that sort are ineffectual...)
The one difference that I can see (and it's not an unimportant one) is that a good parent is open about what they are doing, and talks to the kid, gets the kids opinions. While organizations like the NSA try their hardest to make sure the citizenry don't even know that they're being spied on. This is a way in which a parent's spying might be not quite as bad.
However, remember that at least in theory the USA is a democracy, while a family is best described as a dictatorship. In the ideal world where the US government actually listened to its citizens and engaged in discourse with them, the USG would have by far the moral high ground over parents, even over parents who run a benevolent dictatorship where they actually listen the kid and make family policy accordingly, as a benevolent dictatorship still has certain problems when compared to a true democracy.
In both cases, a figure of authority (legitimate authority!) spys on you, pro[poradly for your own good. (Maybe even really for your own good! Just because the NSA's spying hasn't actually successfully foiled any terrorist plots yet doesn't mean that all spying programs of that sort are ineffectual...)
The one difference that I can see (and it's not an unimportant one) is that a good parent is open about what they are doing, and talks to the kid, gets the kids opinions. While organizations like the NSA try their hardest to make sure the citizenry don't even know that they're being spied on. This is a way in which a parent's spying might be not quite as bad.
However, remember that at least in theory the USA is a democracy, while a family is best described as a dictatorship. In the ideal world where the US government actually listened to its citizens and engaged in discourse with them, the USG would have by far the moral high ground over parents, even over parents who run a benevolent dictatorship where they actually listen the kid and make family policy accordingly, as a benevolent dictatorship still has certain problems when compared to a true democracy.
I've been tasked with raising freshly hatched human beings. My task is to do my best to make sure that these tiny humans turn out to be worthwhile, contributing adult humans. I supervised them during their baths as infants/toddlers because an infant/toddler doesn't know yet that you can drown in very shallow water or that hot water can burn. I supervised them when we first took the training wheels off the bike because balance is hard, crashes happen and need attending to. I supervise them when we're at the playground because not every human in the world is a worthwhile, contributing human and some of them like to do bad things. I supervised them while learning to use a knife because knives can hurt if used incorrectly. I don't understand why people are so confused about a parent supervising a child's computer use. I'm not some fucking idiot that is going to interrogate my kid about why she Googled "Mark Twain". But if I noticed that my 6 year old had been reading up on how to cook Meth, I might want to have a few words with him. It is my job as a parent to make sure he understands that cooking Meth is illegal and dangerous. That doesn't mean he can't have a science kit for his birthday. Raising children is more than keeping a roof over them and feeding them. It is about letting them experience things on their own but stepping in when guidance is needed. But everyone is free to raise their children the best they see fit.
The fact is inspite of all parenting measures each one of us has had encounters as a child, which when looking back might have done us great harm if we were not just plain lucky enough to have supportive parents
As parents ourselves this gets us into the cycle of being protective around our own children and it is definitely needed to minimize the encounters and be there to safely catch them when they fall
A bird pushes its fledgling off a ledge to make it fly but also hurries to take it under its wings when it senses a predator about. Guess this is basically the dilemma of every parent (every child that becomes the parent)
As parents ourselves this gets us into the cycle of being protective around our own children and it is definitely needed to minimize the encounters and be there to safely catch them when they fall
A bird pushes its fledgling off a ledge to make it fly but also hurries to take it under its wings when it senses a predator about. Guess this is basically the dilemma of every parent (every child that becomes the parent)
In fact I’d say that the harm to the trust in your parent that comes from such censorship pretty much outweighs the risk of reading stuff. It’s important to know what the kids do, but that’s to be achieved by having real contact with them and having them tell you that.
Which happens in many families I know, so before anyone says that’s impossible because of the „teenage rebellion”: too bad all the kids that can assert their independence while still talking to their parents about pretty much everything exist.
Which happens in many families I know, so before anyone says that’s impossible because of the „teenage rebellion”: too bad all the kids that can assert their independence while still talking to their parents about pretty much everything exist.
Information is the most dangerous thing there is.
Well, yeah, but not in the sense used by the GP and other assorted pearl-clutchers in the thread.
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Likewise. I turned out ok. I think.
"On the desktop, we’ve updated the default styling of UI elements like form controls and scrollbars"
They kept that one quiet didn't they. A strange "feature" addition that's starting to cause quite an uproar on the Chromium issue tracker: https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=279464
They kept that one quiet didn't they. A strange "feature" addition that's starting to cause quite an uproar on the Chromium issue tracker: https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=279464
From the issue tracker:
> In UI review we decided that these scrollbars are OK for an M32 release, and that if there's bad user uproar we can live with it for one milestone then change in M33.
I wonder how pervasive this view is within the Chrome team. It actually explains a lot of issues I have run into that suddenly get fixed in the next release. I thought they were just bugs that had slipped by, but now am wondering how many were by design.
> In UI review we decided that these scrollbars are OK for an M32 release, and that if there's bad user uproar we can live with it for one milestone then change in M33.
I wonder how pervasive this view is within the Chrome team. It actually explains a lot of issues I have run into that suddenly get fixed in the next release. I thought they were just bugs that had slipped by, but now am wondering how many were by design.
It's really horrible, here's the same radio group in Firefox and new Chrome:
Firefox: http://i.imgur.com/T8dWHcl.png
Chrome: http://i.imgur.com/EMNjV4P.png
The Chrome one somehow removes padding and also looks like a disabled control when in fact it isn't.
Firefox: http://i.imgur.com/T8dWHcl.png
Chrome: http://i.imgur.com/EMNjV4P.png
The Chrome one somehow removes padding and also looks like a disabled control when in fact it isn't.
Chrome's renderer has always been extraordinarily ugly coming from Firefox. HTML Forms and font rendering specifically.
Can anyone explain the use case for the arrows as opposed to using keyboard arrows?
Removing them seems like a great step, but I might be brainwashed by the fact that Mac OS has done away with them already.
Removing them seems like a great step, but I might be brainwashed by the fact that Mac OS has done away with them already.
I don't care much for the arrows. The main issue for me is the lack of consistency with other native Windows applications, and that this also affects other widgets such as check boxes, radio buttons and drop down menus, which now feature a horrible fade animation.
That definitely makes sense. This isn't a case for saying it's "OK," but I feel that a browser is its own sort of contained environment, or at least people have come to accept it as that (since we have applications within each browser) and there is generally not much consistency with native UI elements at that level, so it's mainly that this consistency has been slowly degraded over time and people seem used to it not being consistent enough so that it's OK for the browser to make its own rules to some extent.
They already don't use native tabs (which most OS interfaces provide) and I'd call this a positive. In fact, I'd argue that many of the native UI elements are customized, but most people are used to that, largely because the customizations improve the product, so that's kind of why I asked the original question: what about this change makes the product worse in practice, why not insist all elements be native then if it's just an argument for consistency and not one for a loss of usability/productivity?
They already don't use native tabs (which most OS interfaces provide) and I'd call this a positive. In fact, I'd argue that many of the native UI elements are customized, but most people are used to that, largely because the customizations improve the product, so that's kind of why I asked the original question: what about this change makes the product worse in practice, why not insist all elements be native then if it's just an argument for consistency and not one for a loss of usability/productivity?
I am surprised at the number of people using the scrollbar arrows.
The new scrollbars are annoyingly thin and hard to see, though.
The new scrollbars are annoyingly thin and hard to see, though.
I'm surprised this doesn't interfere with accessibility guidelines.
Chrome's scrollbar changes or the non-native Aura UI itself?
Both sets of changes, but in particular, the scrollbar changes.
Was about to say but didnt want to hijack the topic. Also there is plenty of problems with low-level graphics cards rendering links and bold text. It looks very blurry now.
Does someone know how this feature works?
I thought this was difficult/impossible to do because plugins like flash communicate directly with the OS APIs, bypassing Chrome (this was confirmed by the Chrome team in a reddit AMA a while back).
I suppose this is possible with the Flash plugin that comes bundled with Chrome, but what about other plugins, like Java?
Edit: never mind, found this on omgchrome: "the indicator will be successfully triggered by most browser audio...this means the flash version that comes built-in with Chrome, HTML5 content and apps making use of PPAPI/NACL plugins. But a few things aren't picked up, including anything making use of "out of Chrome" plugins, like Silverlight and Quicktime."
I thought this was difficult/impossible to do because plugins like flash communicate directly with the OS APIs, bypassing Chrome (this was confirmed by the Chrome team in a reddit AMA a while back).
I suppose this is possible with the Flash plugin that comes bundled with Chrome, but what about other plugins, like Java?
Edit: never mind, found this on omgchrome: "the indicator will be successfully triggered by most browser audio...this means the flash version that comes built-in with Chrome, HTML5 content and apps making use of PPAPI/NACL plugins. But a few things aren't picked up, including anything making use of "out of Chrome" plugins, like Silverlight and Quicktime."
Good feature, but to take it one step further. I'd like to request an auto-mute feature filtered by domain names. Why?
Too often, when you are surfing on streaming movie sites and porn sites, you are forced to disable AdBlock in order for the videos to load properly; but you'd get those annoying popup tabs in the backgrounds with JasmineCam for porn sites and P&G/J&J household product ads for movie streaming sites. I'd like to mute those tabs right away and also right click and add them to the "mute audio list". Someone with the pull, please add this to the Chromium project tracker!
Too often, when you are surfing on streaming movie sites and porn sites, you are forced to disable AdBlock in order for the videos to load properly; but you'd get those annoying popup tabs in the backgrounds with JasmineCam for porn sites and P&G/J&J household product ads for movie streaming sites. I'd like to mute those tabs right away and also right click and add them to the "mute audio list". Someone with the pull, please add this to the Chromium project tracker!
This feature should be implemented as an extension. The only reasonable thing to request in the project tracker is to have the audio status available in the extension api.
So, if I'm researching and I have ~40 tabs open, what will be visible? I already have trouble seing the tab titles.
Modern desktop displays are wider than they ought to be. Vertical space is scarce while there's almost always space left on the sides. I still can't grasp that they scratched the vertical tabs feature, because it made total sense. The reason I'm on Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/sv-se/firefox/addon/tree-style-ta...
Modern desktop displays are wider than they ought to be. Vertical space is scarce while there's almost always space left on the sides. I still can't grasp that they scratched the vertical tabs feature, because it made total sense. The reason I'm on Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/sv-se/firefox/addon/tree-style-ta...
Close but no cigar.
Unless I specify otherwise, media should play in a window only when it's active, unless I specify otherwise.
Media should not play automatically by default. Again, unless I've activated it.
A bigger issue is that browsers are absolute crap for managing content generally. My typical session is: start with a few launching points (project pages, wiki/blog, newsreader, possibly social page), queue up material to look at.
At this point, my preference would be that the material I've queued up doesn't even fucking load. Too many pages and too much memory simply pigs stuff out.
Most browsers currently have a "pin as app" option for tabs -- if you want your GitHub, CampFire, Jira, Gmail, or similar pages to run as apps, then set them to run as apps.
Unfortunately, the browser has, for some time, been stuck in a worst-of-all-possible-worlds limbo: it's neither a good reading environment -- for that you'd want something like Readability, Pocket, Instapaper, or an eBook management tool such as Moon+Reader, Kindle, or (bad as it is) Calibre -- nor a decent applications environment: it's bloated, crash-prone, slow, full of security holes, and underfeatured relative to native applications.
However in both cases the browser's ability to load and display or run arbitrary content makes it convenient.
What do I want? Vastly better content management tools. Bookmarks and tab management on steroids. As Jay-Z said: I've got 99 tabs open and your autoplay isn't the one I'm looking at. If something's in background, let it fucking die already, saving state somewhere and restoring it should I happen to navigate back to it. Keeping a small number of tabs (2? 6? 12?) active should be more than enough. Least used gets offed when I switch to number n+1.
And figure out what the hell you want to do with the applications space. I do use some Web apps, but still largely find them annoying. I've all but given up on G+ and Gmail for numerous reasons, but the fact that my Chromium session becomes completely unusable once I've got either open really doesn't help matters much.
Frankly, this is like providing cleaner, brighter living quarters for slaves when what needs to be done is emancipation. I appreciate the thought, but it's far too little, far too late.
Unless I specify otherwise, media should play in a window only when it's active, unless I specify otherwise.
Media should not play automatically by default. Again, unless I've activated it.
A bigger issue is that browsers are absolute crap for managing content generally. My typical session is: start with a few launching points (project pages, wiki/blog, newsreader, possibly social page), queue up material to look at.
At this point, my preference would be that the material I've queued up doesn't even fucking load. Too many pages and too much memory simply pigs stuff out.
Most browsers currently have a "pin as app" option for tabs -- if you want your GitHub, CampFire, Jira, Gmail, or similar pages to run as apps, then set them to run as apps.
Unfortunately, the browser has, for some time, been stuck in a worst-of-all-possible-worlds limbo: it's neither a good reading environment -- for that you'd want something like Readability, Pocket, Instapaper, or an eBook management tool such as Moon+Reader, Kindle, or (bad as it is) Calibre -- nor a decent applications environment: it's bloated, crash-prone, slow, full of security holes, and underfeatured relative to native applications.
However in both cases the browser's ability to load and display or run arbitrary content makes it convenient.
What do I want? Vastly better content management tools. Bookmarks and tab management on steroids. As Jay-Z said: I've got 99 tabs open and your autoplay isn't the one I'm looking at. If something's in background, let it fucking die already, saving state somewhere and restoring it should I happen to navigate back to it. Keeping a small number of tabs (2? 6? 12?) active should be more than enough. Least used gets offed when I switch to number n+1.
And figure out what the hell you want to do with the applications space. I do use some Web apps, but still largely find them annoying. I've all but given up on G+ and Gmail for numerous reasons, but the fact that my Chromium session becomes completely unusable once I've got either open really doesn't help matters much.
Frankly, this is like providing cleaner, brighter living quarters for slaves when what needs to be done is emancipation. I appreciate the thought, but it's far too little, far too late.
I can't help but wonder if it's too late for that at this point. Users expect a page to be "loading" while they're not looking at it. Loading and running both swf and javascript often takes part as the initialization of the page. It's frustrating to a user when they open multiple tabs and expect them to be loaded by the time they switch to one, but the page is just now starting to load.
Maybe this is a symptom of the fact that loading orders, preloading, etc isn't built into the standard, but is hacked on top?
Maybe this is a symptom of the fact that loading orders, preloading, etc isn't built into the standard, but is hacked on top?
So, how about this happens: I add a link to my reading queue. This _downloads the content_ but then saves it to cache. The page isn't rendered. It doesn't even open as a tab, but as some sort of reading queue, linked by context to where I opened it from, date, and other related metadata, plus more I can add (tags, etc.), later.
If I want it rendered in a clean "Instapaper" view, I get that too.
If it's ephemera, it clears automatically. If I want to have it stick around, that too.
When I actually _do_ load it up, it's reading locally from disk. This is pretty much how Readability itself works, in the app versions, and it's quick even on low-powered devices such as my rather old HTC Incredible Android phone (faster than most Web pages these days, and rather more compatible as I'm now multiple revs out of date).
As for SWF and Javascript: I tend to keep both disabled by default, and for most content, neither SWF nor Javascript are generally meaningful. There's the odd site which fails utterly to render without them (it's more than a tad bit ironic that Google's own blogging platform is one of the worse offenders), but that's pretty much the minority.
If I want it rendered in a clean "Instapaper" view, I get that too.
If it's ephemera, it clears automatically. If I want to have it stick around, that too.
When I actually _do_ load it up, it's reading locally from disk. This is pretty much how Readability itself works, in the app versions, and it's quick even on low-powered devices such as my rather old HTC Incredible Android phone (faster than most Web pages these days, and rather more compatible as I'm now multiple revs out of date).
As for SWF and Javascript: I tend to keep both disabled by default, and for most content, neither SWF nor Javascript are generally meaningful. There's the odd site which fails utterly to render without them (it's more than a tad bit ironic that Google's own blogging platform is one of the worse offenders), but that's pretty much the minority.
This is precisely how Safari's Reading List feature works. (Not that anyone would ever use it to know.)
Pity that's not an open standards multi-platform browser or I might try it.
But good to know.
But good to know.
Those are points that would be great, formatted in a Firefox bug (or rather, enhancement request).
By the way, Firefox has don't-load-till-opened tabs, it's just not on by default. Go to the preferences, "General", click on the "don't load tabs until selected" checkbox.
Also, in "about:config", the "plugins.click_to_play" option (which I believe is now on by default) allows you to block plugins by default. Go to "about:addons", in the plugins section, to specify which plugins you wish to block by default.
Close enough too, but like I said, a bug report targeted at HTML media (not just plugins) would probably be well-received.
By the way, Firefox has don't-load-till-opened tabs, it's just not on by default. Go to the preferences, "General", click on the "don't load tabs until selected" checkbox.
Also, in "about:config", the "plugins.click_to_play" option (which I believe is now on by default) allows you to block plugins by default. Go to "about:addons", in the plugins section, to specify which plugins you wish to block by default.
Close enough too, but like I said, a bug report targeted at HTML media (not just plugins) would probably be well-received.
I gave up on Firefox (sobbing, I might add) when I found 1) it would bog out hopelessly with the tab loads I was throwing at it 2) all the worse when I was running Chrome in parallel (which is worse for memory management but allows me to reclaim it usually by killing off tabs), and 3) I got hooked on Stylebot for restyling websites.
The fact that Debian tends to stay well behind the Firefox / Iceweasel release curve (and manual updates suck) hasn't helped, though it looks as if I've got Iceweasel 24 available now. I'd have to check to see how much of the memory-management goodness has gotten into it.
All that said: yeah, I'll see if I can't find FF bugzilla and write that request.
The fact that Debian tends to stay well behind the Firefox / Iceweasel release curve (and manual updates suck) hasn't helped, though it looks as if I've got Iceweasel 24 available now. I'd have to check to see how much of the memory-management goodness has gotten into it.
All that said: yeah, I'll see if I can't find FF bugzilla and write that request.
Now if you can just mute it directly from the tab they'd really be onto something.
You can: by closing the tab.
Which is what I plan to do to any tab that plays sound I didn't ask for.
Which is what I plan to do to any tab that plays sound I didn't ask for.
I would prefer preventing audio + video to start on a tab that is not selected.
That would also prevent using a web browser to run a music player in the background.
Note the phrase preventing to start. Already playing media would be unaffected.
+: Also the rule would be extended to include minimized browser even if the tab is selected.
+: Also the rule would be extended to include minimized browser even if the tab is selected.
What does that even mean? You can't stop at a single file or stream as that would most likely still break things. If you allow tabs that play sound to continue to play sound you could just run a small, short, silent sound file on page load and then do whatever you want for the life of the tab.
I think you could mitigate the 'play short/silent sound on page load'. Each tab would have a max volume limit. The limit can be increased automatically while the tab is open, but it must stay within some % of that limit when the tab is not open. The default limit would be 0. You can add some restraints on the length of sound too, like require a sound to play for at least a second before adopting its new volume for the tab.
Agreed. This is a good start though. It's features like this that makes the utilitarian in me nod in approval.
Why don't they just give you the option to only play the video/audio when the tab is active?
Facebook already auto-starts some videos only when they are in view, so the technology is available.
If you want streaming audio, you just have to open up a new window.
Facebook already auto-starts some videos only when they are in view, so the technology is available.
If you want streaming audio, you just have to open up a new window.
Lots of people stream Pandora and YouTube in background. Few people use new windows. Adding a control for users to decide would sacrifice simplicity of UX.
Exactly: let the user decide "I need this thing to keep playing music/video in the background." But unless he enables it, play it only when it's topmost.
Does a similar feature exist in firefox? Or even as an addon?
Several searches couldn't yield a result.
Several searches couldn't yield a result.
So, I've got a little hacky patch that _kind of_ does that, but only for <video> and <audio>, because we don't have access to flash's source code, so we can't hook into it. This (only <audio> + <video> + Web Audio these days) is not really hard to do, I can guide a volunteer if someone feels like writing the patch (or part of it, even).
I've been thinking about dll interception stuff to make it work with flash, but I'm not sure if it can be done reliably.
I've been thinking about dll interception stuff to make it work with flash, but I'm not sure if it can be done reliably.
> I've been thinking about dll interception stuff
In Win7 you get audio volume per process option when you click the speaker tray icon. So the OS does know the process source of audio
Since Chrome is multi-process I think it's easy to identify the noisy process.
Just an idea.
In Win7 you get audio volume per process option when you click the speaker tray icon. So the OS does know the process source of audio
Since Chrome is multi-process I think it's easy to identify the noisy process.
Just an idea.
He's talking about Firefox here. :)
But anyway, major browsers (other than IE) -- even when tab per process -- only use a single Flash process for all tabs, so you cannot distinguish at the operating system level. Chrome is now able to show audio indicators because Flash is embedded via a new kind of plug-in (Pepper) which allows them to track it.
But anyway, major browsers (other than IE) -- even when tab per process -- only use a single Flash process for all tabs, so you cannot distinguish at the operating system level. Chrome is now able to show audio indicators because Flash is embedded via a new kind of plug-in (Pepper) which allows them to track it.
Since Firefox knows which tabs embed Flash content and whether the Flash plugin process is playing audio, Firefox might be able to guess which tab is playing Flash audio. For example, if there is only one tab with Flash content. :)
But due to ads, if many tabs are open then many will have Flash on them. Run Chrome, install my MuteTab extension (http://www.mutetab.com/), open a few tabs, and look at the extension popup to get an idea of how pervasive Flash is. (However, if you also run Adblock then it becomes a little more reasonable, since you've greatly reduced the number of tabs playing with Flash on them.)
Yeah, you could look at which tabs were recently opened when sound started playing. But then once sound is playing, you won't be able to detect if another tab that plays sound was opened. And the sound might have come from a tab that had been open for awhile.
Yeah, you could look at which tabs were recently opened when sound started playing. But then once sound is playing, you won't be able to detect if another tab that plays sound was opened. And the sound might have come from a tab that had been open for awhile.
if you could contact me via email I'd be interested in trying.
padenot at mozilla dot com, or #media on irc.mozilla.org (French timezone, I'm padenot, there).
Here is the feature request in Firefox's Bugzilla: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=486262
In Windows 7 at least, Firefox breaks out each tab into its own subpanel in the Volume Mixer and each instance of Flash (for example) that might be producing sound. It's pretty easy from there to determine which tab is making a racket.
Really? My understanding was the IE was the only major browser that would use multiple Flash instances. You may have just noticed a difference between HTML5 audio/HTML5 video/web audio and sound from plug-ins. (I can check later when near a Windows box.)
Also, I'm generally curious about how IE is able to get away with this since I think the Chrome team said creating multiple Flash instances wasn't reliable because Flash wasn't designed for it in some way (in addition to eating a lot of memory.)
Also, I'm generally curious about how IE is able to get away with this since I think the Chrome team said creating multiple Flash instances wasn't reliable because Flash wasn't designed for it in some way (in addition to eating a lot of memory.)
Apologies, I was wrong - that's what I get for posting without checking what I'd seen before. You are right, only one Flash instance shows up for multiple sources playing audio/video.
It would be great if a JavaScript-based Flash (such as Shumway) gets to the point where it works well enough for a large number of audio sources. I imagine then sound would show up to the browser as HTML5 audio or webaudio, which could then be tracked.
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Finally! I have wanted this feature since I started using tabs, about 10 years ago. Yet another win for Chrome.
This only goes half way, sadly: noisy tabs will only be shown with the symbol in your Window list if they are the active window in that tab. If you have another tab open, it's that tab that will appear there, so you will still have to hunt down all your windows and then look for a tab with the symbol.
Disappointing.
Similarly, I can't believe it's still not possible to name an entire window, e.g. "Hacker News", which would contain all my open HN tabs.
Disappointing.
Similarly, I can't believe it's still not possible to name an entire window, e.g. "Hacker News", which would contain all my open HN tabs.
Alternatively, we could have designed the web so that autoplay of audio/video isn't a thing.
Autoplay provides better UX for some sites, though.
Wait, did they just release the Aura/ChromeOS desktop as a Metro app?
It kind of seems that way. I was wondering the same thing so I tried out - sure enough, launching it in metro mode and it looks like what I expect ChromeOS would be (I don't actually have a device running ChromeOS), with an apps bar, a clock, and "start/apps" button.
what's with the submission's titles ? This one is obviously marketing aka false. I'm using opera on linux to browse the web, how a new feature in chrome affects me ?
The submission title comes from the source webpage. (Look at the source URL for context.) It says "everyone" because the previous announcement was that people using the beta version had this feature.
So, assuming I'm using Chrome, how do I download malicious file now? (Assuming, I know it's malware but still want to download it, say, for further dissection.)
wget. curl. Seriously, if you're dealing with malicious files, you don't want some massive software package interacting with it. Attack surface area, and all that.
I noticed this not too long ago. It's a very welcome addition since there are so many audio/video ads that autoplay these days.
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This is Brilliant! My reasons to continue using Firefox are reducing by day :(.
This works well in Ubuntu too.
Excellent. Could have used this feature when AOL acquired the Huffington Post.
Most solutions are far too technical for most parents to understand and their children are more technically aware than they are, even at a young age.
It is of course important that parents can educate their children about the dangers of the internet, but such a feature is like having stabilisers on a bike. Once your children show you that they can be trusted the you can take the supervision off and give them the privacy they they too deserve.
I think Google is hitting a sweet spot if they can get that feature right.
http://chrome.blogspot.de/2013/10/a-beta-preview-supervised-...