Mozilla released a standalone Firefox Nightly test build recently that includes support for vertical tabs. Here is how it looks.
  • Karna ( KarnaSubarna@lemmy.ml ) OP
    38·
    3 years ago

    Bad news is that it is not clear at this point whether Mozilla is going to go forward with the implementation. A post on Reddit by one of the project members suggests that the build is a “rough proof-of-concept”. Some features tested in the build “did not survive”. It is unclear which did not, as they are not mentioned. Mozilla is, however, implementing those that survived the cut into Firefox. Again, the poster does not mention which those are. It is also not verified that the poster is actually a member of the project team, so take this with a grain of salt as well.

      • GreyBeard ( greybeard@lemmy.one ) 
        7·
        3 years ago

        Not the person you replied to, but I can help with an example:

        1. I have the browser reopen the tabs I had open last time, but keeps unloaded until I click on them.
        2. The tabs are in a tree hierarchy, meaning I can collapse an entire group while keeping them all open.
        3. My work involves juggling up to 50 different accounts each for a hand full of websites, so containers allow me to quickly swap between accounts signed into the same page.
          • howrar ( howrar@lemmy.ca ) 
            1·
            3 years ago

            Personally, I can’t use bookmarks because if they’re out of sight, they get forgotten. Keeping things in an open tab is like having the browser constantly bugging me to remind me that I have to do this thing. It doesn’t guarantee that it gets addressed in a timely manner, but with the alternative it’s guaranteed to not be done at all.

            It also helps to keep my place in my work. There’s things that I’ll always have open because I need quick access to them and don’t want the friction of trying to find the page to lead to procrastination. Same with anything that’s relevant to work in progress.

          • Onihikage ( Onihikage@beehaw.org ) English
            1·
            3 years ago

            When you’re keeping things in a tree structure for visual grouping and using containers to manage different logins, bookmarks will lose the tree structure, and you’ll have to specify which container to open it in. If your workflow involves a dozen tabs per context, locating the bookmarks and reopening them every time you switch contexts is a significant time and productivity loss.

            Consider the classic Evidence Board (also known as string wall, crazy wall, conspiracy board, etc.). Saving everything to bookmarks is the equivalent of putting your board’s contents into a drawer, then pinning everything back up whenever you need to look at or update that particular conspiracy. It works, but it’s cumbersome, error-prone, and wastes a lot of time; you’d only do this if you only have one board but multiple things to inspect. Leaving tabs open and simply unloading the inactive tab trees is like having multiple separate boards where you just roll them into a closet when you aren’t using them.

        • pop ( pop@lemmy.ml ) 
          1·
          3 years ago

          My work involves juggling up to 50 different accounts each for a hand full of websites, so containers allow me to quickly swap between accounts signed into the same page.

          So like astroturfing?

  • Flaky ( Flaky@iusearchlinux.fyi ) English
    16·
    3 years ago

    Those screenshots look really nice, ngl, hoping this goes through. Edge and Vivaldi have had their own vertical tab implementations for a while now, and there are Firefox forks that show it can be done. No reason for base Firefox not to have it at this point.

    While I’m here, Mozilla bring back compact spacing, plz k thx.

    Edit: Just tried it, it’s got that nightly jank but it’s promising. I hope Mozilla continues with this. It looks and feels great.

    • Onihikage ( Onihikage@beehaw.org ) English
      11·
      3 years ago

      since most languages are written horizontally and i like ux to reflect this structure. such things are subjective though

      You might be misunderstanding what we mean by vertical tabs - we aren’t literally turning the tabs sideways and putting them on the side of the browser. We’re placing the tabs, still horizontal, into a stacked, scrollable list on the side of the browser. The superiority of this display method for tabs on widescreen displays is not subjective, and here’s why:

      1. Tab titles are not typically very long, but there tend to be a lot of them. This data is far more readable and accessible as a bulleted list than a long paragraph.
      2. Beyond about ten to fifteen tabs, tabs displayed at the top, side by side, must either shrink and obscure the title, go off-screen and be invisible without scrolling, or stack in multiple rows across the top. A vertical tab setup can easily display 30-40 of them in a vertical list, all with the maximum visible amount of their titles which helps distinguish them from one another.
      3. Modern desktop screens are wider than they are high, but webpage content scrolls vertically, often leaving a lot of empty space on the sides.
      4. Eyestrain is reduced and readability improves when the width of the reading area is reduced. This is why text on the web almost never fills the full width of a widescreen display, why most books are taller than they are wide, and why newsprint articles have many narrow columns rather than filling the entire page.
      5. Given points 3 and 4, tabs at the top of the browser window on a widescreen display leave slightly less room for the actual page contents, while tabs displayed in a vertical list on one side only cut into the white space that exists on the sides of the content, while keeping the titles readable and causing less eyestrain.
      6. With one change, a list can become an outline with sections and headers, following your own train of thought as you branch out and expand on each idea. In the same way, tabs displayed as a list can be very easily displayed with a tree structure, allowing tabs to be grouped, collapsed, and generally organized in ways that are impossible for traditional-style top-tabs.

      This is why Tree Style Tabs exists, though I prefer Sidebery these days, being more customizable and performant than TST. There’s no way I can ever go back to top-tabs.

  • Jo Miran ( JoMiran@lemmy.ml ) 
    9·
    3 years ago

    I would love the option of keeping containers in vertical tabs with “page tabs” horizontal. For example; Facebook, Personal, Banking, Work, Incognito, etc containers along the left as vertical tabs, and each one has all the pages in tabs across the top. Vertical tabs only appear after you open more than one type of container.

  • GunnarGrop ( GunnarGrop@lemmy.ml ) 
    9·
    3 years ago

    My dream would for this to at least have an option for collapsable tree-style tabs. That’s what I’m missing the most from the Edge implementation. Even “normal” vertical tabs struggle when you have over a hundred open tabs.

    • Cethin ( Cethin@lemmy.zip ) English
      3·
      3 years ago

      Which, ironically, is probably a better representation of horizontal. No one talks about finding a shelf in a bookshelf. They talk about finding a book, which are laid out horizontally.

    • Onihikage ( Onihikage@beehaw.org ) English
      2·
      3 years ago

      The very first version of Tree Style Tabs was published in… hmm…

      2007

      The shameful part is the fact that Edge-Chromium added a native tree style tabs feature over three years ago, and has been eating Firefox’s lunch. Vivaldi has had native vertical tabs for eight years! Mozilla’s leadership is asleep at the wheel.