The clear and complete address field dropdown control panel we don't have
Friday, 18. July 2008, 03:48:40
last revised: Aug 20: 9.52 labels bookmark hits
The address field dropdown has become a challenging topic. For example:
It all can be sorted out - with quite a number of surprising discoveries in the process. One ends up understanding the system, what it can and can't do, how much better it could be with the same underlying elements more scrupulously used, what the flaws in the implementation are and what principles they violate. One also gains unexpected insight into how something potentially liberating, complete and simple ends up cramped, incomplete and confusing. This is world class software: and what follows is an analysis - not brilliant, but dogged and unflinching - that if not dismissed in bewilderment will change your concept of world clss.
The address field dropdown has become a challenging topic. For example:
- what exactly is on that list?
- can one selectively turn off the various types of matches?
- is there any way to get back to the on-demand list option we had before?
- can the useful chronological order be restored? (And what order IS it in?)
- what does it take these days to surf without leaving tracks that will come spilling down next time someone starts to type an address?
It all can be sorted out - with quite a number of surprising discoveries in the process. One ends up understanding the system, what it can and can't do, how much better it could be with the same underlying elements more scrupulously used, what the flaws in the implementation are and what principles they violate. One also gains unexpected insight into how something potentially liberating, complete and simple ends up cramped, incomplete and confusing. This is world class software: and what follows is an analysis - not brilliant, but dogged and unflinching - that if not dismissed in bewilderment will change your concept of world clss.
obvious questions
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What is all that stuff? Three types of matches now show up on the dropdown, none of which is the type that used to. What used to show up was typed-in history, or TIH (the Opera.dir file). What shows up now is hits from: a cache of visited page content (the VPS folder - recording and display both new); bookmarks (Opera6.adr - display here new), and the list from the history panel, which we'll call browse history or BH (Global.dat file; display here new).
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Is there any way to tell which is which on the list? No. They aren't marked in any way. The only feature which might permit you to distinguish is size. BH items - URL and name, no content - are definitely one line, and VPS are often and perhaps always two lines, but bookmarks are two-line if they have a description. So any specimen potentially belongs to two classes. It would obviously be both very helpful to the user and a trivial task to implement some indicator of class, but this has not been done. update, Aug 20: in 9.52 the word "bookmark" is now prefixed to bookmark paths. Not as compact as an icon (and why not mark all types?) - but way better than nothing.
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Is there any way to get newest-on-top back? No - although bookmarks and BH items are certainly time-stamped, and VPS items presumably so - making chronological ordering trivial to implement - it is not an option.
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Is there any way to see matches from TIH any more? No. TIH exists as a strangely defunctionalized relic. You can still drop it down (by clicking the dropdown arrow - twice, if the search-hit dropdown is showing), and pick from it - but you can no longer get matches from it displayed, and selected items are no longer moved to the top. Consequently your favorites will never be pulled up, and will gradually sink out of view under an accumulating stack of items seldom or never to be used again. It is a sad, static, baffling shadow of the dynamic list of the past.
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The list, resorting at each keystroke, is distracting; how do I turn it off? Using the auto dropdown preference. (But you should be aware that this also turns off recording of typed-in history.)
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Why on Earth does switching off the display supress TIH recording? I believe this can only be interpreted as a chaotic outcome of a chaotic process. If TIH has any value at all, it certainly should not be capriciously tied to some unrelated variable - yet that is what has happened. It is a headhshaker: gratuitous data loss which will certainly confuse and inconvenience users.
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Are there any other cases where a switch obviously associated with one thing also controls something else and may cause unexpected data loss? Yes. There is a switch which turns off recording of VPS - which some users may be moved to try for performance reasons - and it also deletes the archive. The checkbox is labelled, "Remember content on visited pages" - which certainly permits the interpetation that it is a single-action switch for recording. A clearer warning certainly seems appropriate when unchecking the box deletes megabytes of possibly valued data.
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Is there possibly some reason why the record-VPS switch must also delete the archive? Of course not. It's just a file. It would be trivial to keep the functions distinct and provide switches for both.
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A lot of my bookmarks are old, and are swamping what would otherwise be a more useful list. Can I turn their display off? No. Neither bookmarks nor BH can be selectively turned off. Although it would of course be trivial to provide a switch for each list, only VPS has one. Switch added in 9.60, Oct 2008.
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Is there no way at all to get bookmarks off the list? Well - you could make an empty bookmark file and load it (via file menu in Manage Bookmarks), but then you would have to reload the real file to use a bookmark.
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I used to turn off autocomplete, and consult the typed-in dropdown sometimes; is that still possible? No. There will be nothing to see, because TIH is not recorded while matchlist display is off. Remember - neither has its own switch.
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Is there any way to turn off all history recording? No. You can turn off VPS via Prefs/Advanced/History and TIH by turning off the dropdown, but you can't turn off BH.
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Is there a way to clear all histories? Yes: Tools / Delete personal data / history of visited pages gets all three.
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Can the types be cleared individually? Yes. VPS and TIH can be cleared at P/A/History. VPS is cleared (the folder disappears) when the feature is switched off (checkbox); clearing TIH is a button. And items can be deleted from BH - so select-all, delete in the history panel clears that. There are also function calls you can assign within the interface: Clear Typed-In History (TIH) and Clear Visited History (BH+VPS). The deletion system is competent.
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Suppose I don't want another user of the same computer to know what I have been doing - is that possible? You can switch TIH off by suppressing the dropdown and delete the BH record of your session manually. But VPS is wiped out if recording is switched off - so if you want to leave no indication that you are hiding history, you will need to make a copy of the VPS folder before you start, and rename it VPS when you're done. And other traces - such as favicons - accumulate: to intercept them, you would need to swap in a temporary Images folder before your session, then delete it and reactivate the original after. So - no, there is no privacy switch. "Delete personal data" leaves the dated trail of favicons there for anyone who knows to look. It also obliterates all history, instead of that of just the current session - which both makes its own use obvious and perhaps creates an inhibiting cost in terms of lost data.
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suppose I just want to keep clutter from casual browsing out of my content cache, both to preserve more valuable cache content and to keep litter out of the dropdown: can't I switch off recording? No. Again: the switch which stops recording also triggers deletion of the cache. You can only achieve the stop-recording-but-don't-erase outcome by moving or renaming the VPS folder.
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Can I create custom buttons, keystrokes, or menu items to get around some of these limitations? To make matchlist display and TIH recording separately controllable, or to switch off bookmark display? No. The required atomic functions (that is, single-class, single-action functions which are the elementary units of the system) haven't been set up as Opera function calls. It's not just that the default setup doesn't make them convenient: they don't exist. Some of them can be effected by file operations - loading an empty bookmark file or swapping in a new VPS folder by renaming - which could be done by macros (strings of actions) if Opera actions could control shell dialogs (the Windows-like dialogs you get with file operations) - but they can't.
more strangely
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you say BH is included - but if I open my history panel, and type part of a name I see there, it doesn't come up as a hit. Why is that? The search includes URL, name and content for VPS; URL, name and description for bookmarks - but only URL for BH - even though history items include names.
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But isn't that incoherent, confusing and likely to mislead people who think they can search by page name, and therefore falsely conclude that missed items are somehow not in the archive? Yes.
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What order ARE the items in? What I believe I have observed (though I am not yet entirely sure) is that it's not chronological, it's not alphabetical and they're not sorted by category. Apparently some uncontrolled byproduct of machine process; this happens in Opera - the same is true of the sessions list.
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But isn't that incredible? I mean, the new gem at the heart of Kestrel, a central reference tool... a list in random order? The implausible, if proven, becomes known fact and dissonant concepts must be adjusted. Opera is world-class software - but everything on this page is true. How do those facts fit together? We've learned surprising facts about what world class is. Competent by the standards of the age - but under the microscope of careful observation, incoherent and riddled with blunders which seem quite startling. You won't be able to process the information, but it shows that this calm methodical consideration is somehow a skill which was missing from the process which generated the specimen - though no-one involved senses any deficit in their skills and procedures. People are a wonderful development - but history is far from complete. No primitive culture ever recognizes itself as primitive; nobody ever sees what they're not seeing.
Here's a rundown, by feature:
content cached for Visited Page Search (VPS)
- seen on address bar dropdown, history panel, Opera:historysearch page, and Manage History page generable in various ways, including by typing "h (anything)" in the address field. (I have seen reports of differences in mathchlists for different modes.)
- the Preference switch stops display, not recording. It is the only one of the seven atomic switches to be implemented.
- checkbox for "remember content" at Prefs/Advanced/History stops recording and deletes cache.
- cleared (all three are) by Tools/delete private data/detailed options/clear history of visited pages.
- location: VPS folder within Profile (does not exist if option switched off)
typed-in history
- only transient display of static list now possible, via dropdown arrow (or down key if matchlist display is off)
- recording controlled by Auto Dropdown pref, which controls (display of everything and recording of TIH). No way to get recording without matchlist display; old option of continuous recording and occasional matchlist display has been lost.
- to clear: command (clear typed-in history); button at P/A/History.
- location: Opera.dir file
solecisms (that is: outputs which violate some standard and show some deficit)
- three data types jumbled together and made indistinguishable. Is that a bookmark from two years ago, or a recent search result? You have no way of telling. Ability to scan for wanted items greatly impaired. They start out separated. Gratuitous; astonishing blunder.
- chronological list, selected items pulled back to the top, made the resource more useful: another history panel, effortlessly accessed at the point of need, which many learned to rely on. That's ease of use; that's what computers are good at. Solecism to throw it away.
- of the 7 atomic switches, 1 is provided, 4 are present only in badly fused controls, and two are impossible.
- specimen clarity solecism, from Delete Personal Data: checkbox for "Clear history of visited pages". Clarity is well-written software: language triggers images in minds. Errors are as real in failed explanation as in buggy software - because it is buggy software. Stepping through the code is sensitively considering possible misinterpretaion. "of visited pages"? Baffling term, because: is there some other sort of history? Is a distinction actually being made? One is left wondering if it's a relic term from pre-VPS days and clears only BH, or if it's an attempt to specify VPS, whose name it largely repeats. And - is that meant to exclude TIH? TIH includes search strings which aren't pages... such possible points of doubt must be identified and handled. "Clear all histories" would be somewhat clear (but invites the cautious user to wonder, "are there some types I've forgotten that I shouldn't be clearing?"); "clear all history (browse, content & typed-in)" would be perfect.
- adding bookmarks to the dropdown must have seemed a little bonus, thrown in with the big new feature of VPS. Well, OK, if no harm done; but bookmarks are not current in the way the history lists are - so people with a lot of them will find the function throwing up a lot of stale clutter they have to wade through. No problem, if the addition could be switched off - but it can't. The solecism lies not in imperfect assessment of what may be found desirable - that is inevitable - but in the recklessness of relying on such assessment. One may think one has considered all cases: often, one will be wrong. Make switches that get down to bare metal, the real components of the system: does no harm, makes everything possible, eliminates the possibility of regrettable oversight.
- four-way control which mingles two distinct action-types is confusing because illogical, and likely to cause data loss because people will think it is a sensible master display switch.
missed opportunities & proper form
- should data on this vital list be organized by class or by time? Obviously, switchable. Sometimes you know category, sometines you know date. View modes exist in the panels: not much of a stretch here.
- provide atomic-level controls - don't impose your putative cleverness or higher wisdom with fused-only controls.
- provide sensible fused controls: those where the fusion is coherent and serves a purpose. In this case: "clear all history" - which exists; "stop all display without changing record settings"; and "stop recording all history" - a known user desire which can't even be effected through this UI, and at present requires file manipulations outside of Opera.
- clicking the arrow at the end of the address field (or tapping Escape) closes the dropdown. But with the next keystroke it comes back. It shouldn't. A noisy feature instantly becomes much less annoying if there is an obvious and easy way to shut it off - because those who are starting to get annoyed can remove the annoyance. Is there a use case in which people are tapping escape because they want to close the dropdown for half a second? I don't think so. Is it a process bug to ignore predictable annoyance caused by one's decisions" If you think about it, certainly. And because reactions and images and feelings ARE predictable - and sufficient if anticipated to determine behavior - there are right answers. What sufficient sensitivty and thoughtfulness would guide one to is what should be done - proper, correct: and anything else is a solecism. The correct outcome for the escape key tap is not meaningless, not a matter of opinion: it is a fact of nature, whether anyone in the scenario sees it or not.
- clicking the dropdown arrow again opens it in TIH mode - which hardly matters now, because TIH has been eviscerated. However - there was no need to do anything to TIH: a mature and valued system. The dropdown arrow already works as a three-state switch. If switches to no-list mode and TIH mode were sticky instead of transient, and TIH was the old dynamic form, the system would be seriously cool - and nobody would be complaining, because nothing would have been lost. This is ready to go: the parts exist. Correct form.
- the relevant atomic functions lucidly arranged on a control panel, intuitively and conveniently accessible. (Rightclick in address field works well: insert this line in the Edit Go Widget Popup context menu: Item, "history control panel"=show history.)
WIDGETIZE
ckvs # 22. July 2008, 06:24
bothered me from the very first moment of upgrading...well, let's hope they'll do something about it.
btw:
on my machine a search in the search field in history (Ctrl+Alt+H) or via address field: h + search term, brings up results, _but_ the procedure you refer to via Opera:historysearch brings up _nothing_!!
cheers,
chrisk
bpm # 22. July 2008, 07:39
ckvs # 22. July 2008, 09:14
thanks for your attention.
my comment was a bit vague because of a little typing mistake. i meant to say:
a search via entering into the address bar this:
Opera:history
and then, in the search field which comes up, entering xyz brings up _ _0 results_ ("no matches found"), while the same search for xyz done via the other procedures i mentioned _does_ bring up results!
your other comments are absolutely correct!
any observations re the above "search" paradox?
chrisk
bpm # 22. July 2008, 10:17
dapxin # 24. July 2008, 00:22
HaJotKE # 4. August 2008, 18:54
this seems to be complete, well structured and consistent...
Beware: sarcasm...
joshcryer # 5. August 2008, 06:39
jp10558 # 5. August 2008, 11:05
The search seems to use a mix of last visited, most often visited and best partial match, a lot like Google or Find and Run Robot do. So now, with 9.5x 4 - 6 characters almost always get me what I want, and the domain name appears first much of the time.
This is contrasted to 9.27 where the address bar dropdown was almost useless as it would always give me 15
http://my.opera.com/bpm/blog/the-address-field-dropdown-control-panel-we-dont-have
etc that I have to scroll by (and makes it easier to just type out the full thing) rather than
my.opera.com first ...
Obviously, some (many?) users were using the address bar in a way that didn't occur to Opera, and it's good to let them know, but I recall MANY complaints about the matching in 9.2x and earlier on the forums, and as far as I can tell, those issues are fixed in 9.5x.
tinhoy # 5. August 2008, 21:26
In addition to the points that bpm covered, there are some display issues that could be improved.
The first and foremost is that the URL and Name are displayed on the same line. This causes trucation in many URLs and even some Names.
The URLs become useless when all that is shown is the same thing on multiple entries. For example:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&client=oper...
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&client=oper...
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&client=oper...
This is exacerbated when even the Name is truncated, leaving nothing to distinguish one entry from the next.
Putting the Name and URL on two seperate lines should be considered. This will greatly reduce both URL and Name truncation. Also, the current "sea of text" look will be broken up by much needed whitespace to improve readability.
Another issue is that sometimes the Name is the same as the URL. This seems to occur for pages that get redirected or have no title. For example, if I type "blog" in to the address field, I have entries that look like this:
http://my.opera.com/community/blog/show.dml/2317559 http://my.opera.com/community/blog/show.dml...
Duplicating the URL as the Name is more than useless, it is confusing and time consuming. The user is expecting a name, yet is presented with a URL. He has to drastically slow down the scanning of the list to mentally decode and/or discard the URL before moving on to the next item. On top of that, the duplicated URL-as-Name adds more text to the crowded list, reducing whitespace and readability.
Following the URL leads the the "Web Standards Curriculum" page, located at http://my.opera.com/community/blog/wsc. Ideally, Opera should be smart enough to use "Web Standards Curriculum," but if that is too hard to do, then just leave the name blank.
edit:
Note that the URL-as-Name also occurs in the History window, so hopefully any improvement here will also help the usability of History.
For a drastic example of the URL and Name truncation problem, try entering an address using the "Go to Page" popup (F2 shortcut). The default address field is so narrow that nearly every entry is truncated (at least it can be expanded).
Lex1 # 6. August 2008, 13:46
Btw, there is another problem with address field, which here is not mentioned. Manual entered addresses are cutted if Opera.dir bigger than 4Kb and in new Opera you can type only ~100 addresses.
fearphage # 12. September 2008, 19:14
arnyq # 3. October 2008, 13:03
Your analysis looks good, but missing human aspects of the issue:
- at some point a new hire was assigned to add history text search to AB, and experience flow get broken. I doubt, the devs document every step that careful, and they may have several assignments each.
- AB Search may never been discussed on Design Reviews at such detail. As the feature is under development, report this issue in Weekly Snapshot Bugs (http://snapshot.opera.com/faq.html), and it'll get a Review sooner;
- Keep in mind, Opera devs struggle btw adding more user control and interface simplicity. Its always hard to reach balance suitable for an average Joe. I'd say, a new Control Panel would be overkill, but a new section in Opera:config would do;
- I suggest to add 2 Sort options to it:
a) Most Recent First (show recently visited links first);
b) Most Relevant First (most visited by this user - may require adding extra "Times Visited" field to a link History Record).
dapxin # 4. October 2008, 16:05