Firefox 3 AwesomeBar

[Peter Dobratz]

Okay, I like the new "Awesome Bar" even though I'll still always call
it simply the address bar.  I've been using Firefox 3 for a few weeks
now since I upgraded to Ubuntu 8.04.  I've seen some of these negative
comments before, but let me attempt to debunk.

1. Screen real estate

So, the drop down in the address bar takes up more space, so what?  It
only shows up when you are typing in the address bar.  When you're
typing in the address bar, you're trying to go to a web page with a
specific URL (not trying to interact with another application like
Gimp or gnomine).  Even if you were able to see many more URLs in the
drop down list when you start typing, it's a lot easier to just keep
typing until the one you want bubbles to the top and then select it
that to visually inspect each element until you find it.

2. Matches more stuff (too much stuff?)

This is a very good thing.  Most of the time useful information is
buried in the page title or at the end of a URL.  For example, I like
to check a particular players profile on Yahoo Golf
(http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/pga/players/Ben+Crane/3028).  With the
old address bar, I'd have to pretty much type out the full URL which I
can't remember.  Now I just type the last name and I'm there.  Most
websites with structured information are like this with only the
interesting bits of info at the end of the URL.  In an ideal www, all
URLs and page titles would contain equally useful information, but
often in practice it's only one or the other.

At first it seems to show about 6 URLs.  If you click the down arrow
on the right, it shows more matches, but since you're already typing
in the address bar and you have some idea of what you are looking for,
you can just type a few more characters, so rather than just typing
"e", you can type e, followed by two or three other letters and pretty
much narrow down your search.  The whole point is that you're limiting
your search to places that you've already been to.

Yes, it's different, but after using it for a few weeks I find that it
works better for the typical use cases.

Peter

On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 9:28 PM, Ben Scott <dragonhawk at gmail.com> wrote:
>  Been trying Firefox 3 out on my 'nix box at home.  So far, seems
> like an overall improvement.  Does seem faster, especially in the
> history, and for some kinda of JavaScripty pages.  I think the icons
> in the UI theme are a bit too uniform (thus hard to differentiate),
> but that's no biggie.
>
>  But I hate the root-fscking "AwesomeBar".
>
>  For those who don't know, the location bar in Firefox 3 has been
> "improved" to be a search engine with real-time feedback.  If I start
> typing "gnh" to get, oh the GNHLUG website, like I would in Fx 2.0, it
> instead does a full-text partial-word match on everything it can find:
> URLs in history.  Page titles in history.  Bookmark URLs.  Bookmark
> names.  I'm surprised it doesn't just grep my hard drive.
>
>  To highlight just how stupid this is, say I'm an Everything2 noder
> (I'm not, but say I am).  So I type "e" into my location bar,
> expecting that to be my most used URL beginning with "e".  Instead, it
> finds everything in my bookmarks and history that contains the letter
> "e".  *Anywhere*.  wwww.ssssesssss.com?  That matches.  A page titled
> "This thing sucks ssess a lot"?  That matches.
>
>  Oh, and it takes up much more screen real-estate than the old one.
> Much larger fonts, two lines per hit, extra graphics.  It favors
> vertical space over horizontal space, which is especially odd given
> the current trend towards wide-screen displays.
>
>  Apparently, lots of people hate this thing, but the developers are
> pulling a Microsoft and telling users they're wrong and the devs know
> better.
>
>  Anyhow, I haven't found a way to completely disable this abomination
> yet, but the following goes a long way:
>
> Install the "OldBar" Extension (16,000+ downloads and climbing!) to
> change the "look" back to the old way:
>
> https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/6227
>
> Make the following about:config changes to get the "feel" closer to the old way:
>
> browser.urlbar.matchOnlyTyped = True
> browser.urlbar.matchBehavior = 2
>
> -- Ben
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