Post Archive
› February 4, 2003
Sharks with laser beams
Folks using macs these days are lucky, one of the newest reasons for this is the new apple web browser Safari, which, despite being "just a beta" is frikin awesome.
So, you know this already, and you're aware that one of the main developers of Safari, Dave Hyatt, has a weblog (even more amazing). I consider Dave's willingness to share thoughts and notes about Safari development both extreemly good PR, and very generous. His generousity is doubtlessly stretched by a mileu of email, as a recent gentle reminder indicates.
But there is nothing wrong with conjecturing (on our own sites) what would make a great new feature for Safari. My number one "feature to wish for" is tooltips, or alt flags, or whatever those browser generated popup boxes are called that indicate the alt or title attributes (when specified). I'd like to see them rendered in a way simillar to how Safari shows a link being dragged:
What are your thoughts on new features for Safari? Leave a comment with your ideas, with one exception: everyone's cousin's step-brother seems to want tabs, have an idea for tabs, a workaround for tabs, etc. (a sampling) so let's leave that well documented concept out of the loop. I'm looking forward to hearing your ideas.
Comments
1. February 4, 2003 11:49 AM
2. February 4, 2003 12:43 PM
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Michael Z. Posted…
Technical note: Tooltips should only be shown for HTML elements that have a TITLE attribute, which serves to provide additional info. TITLE can be applied to links, images and other kinds of elements. The ALT attribute is supposed to serve as a substitute for an image when it's not visible (e.g. image loading is turned off, server error, text-only browser). It should NOT be shown in a tooltip. When Windows browsers float the alt text "webgraphics" over a visible graphic heading that already says "webgraphics", they are directly contradicting the W3's reccomendation, and also being silly. Why not just show the contents of the TITLE attribute in the status bar at the bottom?3. February 4, 2003 12:53 PM
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Nate Posted…
Michael Z, you make good points. And functionally, the status bar would be a much less intrusive place to show title elements, but on the other hand, in the case of a link, you'd need to mouseover the link, look down at the statusbar, and then look back up to continue where you were reading, so it might actually be more intrusive from a eye movement perspective. Of course all of this is pure extravigance, since the title attribute is supposed to be an accessibility feature as you indicated. I do like the ability to read titles though, often an alternate wording (even of a text link) can be informative in graphical browsers.4. February 4, 2003 01:35 PM
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Darrel Posted…
I'd love for them to steal some of the great features that IE had/has: - A 'real' download manager (compact, stop/reload, etc.) - Apple(?)-click to drag-move the page around - drag-to-save an image - supports text clippings - and others... ;o)5. February 4, 2003 01:59 PM
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evan Posted…
I also think Micheal's idea of putting the "title" attribute info into the status bar is a good idea. Nate, you don't look at the status bar as you click a link? That's very interesting. I personally never ever click on a link without checking to see where it's going to take me - one reason I hate navigating through flash sites so much. Conversely, I've always thought that the info that developers put into their link titles was superfluous and a big waste of time.6. February 4, 2003 08:43 PM
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Joshua Kaufman Posted…
Just to be a weenie, the HTML spec doesn't dictate what tooltips should show, only what they may be used for. From the HTML 4 spec:Values of the title attribute may be rendered by user agents in a variety of ways. For instance, visual browsers frequently display the title as a "tool tip" (a short message that appears when the pointing device pauses over an object).So visual browsers frequently display the title as a tooltip, but they don't have to. We just come to expect it because almost everyone does it. The reason I like Nate's suggestion is because it kills two birds with one stone. It can display the TITLE attribute as well as the URL (if the TITLE is associated with an A element) so one wouldn't have to look in two places to get the info. Finally, for what it's worth I don't always look in the status bar as I click a link either. Who wants to waste half a second every time they click a link? When I think it's warrented I'll look, but every time? Now that's interesting.
7. February 5, 2003 02:17 AM
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hoshi Posted…
they better come up with tabs or an alternative that is better or just as good that is something that will keep many pages opened in specified groups (like i can keep 4 hotmail pages open for my email in one page and 5 open for another site on another page that way its all organized) so grouping is necesary. this feature is so important for all of us. after tabs i cant work on anything else at all. and if its not better than chimera than i and many others just wont be able to switch to it. if they want popularity. they better go with tabs, perfecting tabs, or some other way of grouping elements into seperate pages.8. February 5, 2003 10:17 AM
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vis10n Posted…
TITLE content rendering as a tooltip is a must-have. NOT rendering ALT content is also a must-(not?)-have. Rendering the TITLE in the status bar, wouldn't work (at least for me), as I want to see the URL in the status bar, and frankly, most URLs are too long as it is. Moreover, the TITLE content can be a little verbose at times—why hog-tie it? I love IE's PAGE HOLDER device, as it lets me open links with less fuss—so that's another to-do. Another thing I'd like to see is a way for us to execute link keyboard shortcuts without tripping some other command (perhaps even making something so logical that it could be adopted by the browser community at-large). Finally, I want ACRONYM and ABBREVIATION content rendered as tooltips, too.9. February 5, 2003 10:23 AM
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Chris Posted…
I echo Michael Z's comments about tooltips showing the TITLE (not ALT). Also Darrel's comments - a reload/restart download option would be great (Omniweb does it), and common Apple UI functionality for drag and drop to the desktop. I don't really have a preference for tabs or multiple windows, as long as I can open multiple web pages from a single bookmark. Great for opening my daily blog reads and Mac sites for offline viewing on the train home! One point on the brushed metal look - it is fine as it stands, but adding more chrome to accomodate a tab bar would push it into the 'too much metal' zone.10. February 5, 2003 01:02 PM
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Joshua Kaufman Posted…
Just to clear up any misunderstanings: who said anything about wanting the ALT text to show in the tooltip? I only want the tooltip to show the the TITLE and URL, if relevant.11. February 5, 2003 04:45 PM
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vis10n Posted…
Joshua: I don't know that anyone _here_ said the wanted the ALT text in the tooltip... but the current implementation in many browsers is an awful mix of TITLE and ALT tag display... for example I can't get any TITLE or ALT details for a linked image where both are specified (Mac 9x IE 5x). I think we all agree that whatever happens, Safari shouldn't follow the herd.12. February 6, 2003 05:42 PM
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johnpcooper Posted…
I like the speed but man, Safari is a real clunker IMHO. In the 2 veresons I've tried, it automatically imports IE bookmarks. It doesnt however give you the option to load bookmarks from other sources (i.e. an HTML file). As mentoned by others, tabs are key now. It is fast but i've found that Chimera is faster on my setup.13. February 7, 2003 04:30 PM
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vis10n Posted…
Nate... looks like our prayers have been answered, and Hyatt opened up his blog for general UI wishlist discussion. http://www.mozillazine.org/weblogs/hyatt/archives/2003_02.html#002472 Shame really, but after a little less than 800 comments (too many of them just begging for tabs), the bandwidth faerie shut down the discussion. Nate: FWIW, a trackback here might get some of the comments we've made on Hyatt's radar.14. February 7, 2003 04:30 PM
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vis10n Posted…
PS... Looks like John Gruber has released SmartyPants 1.1!15. February 7, 2003 05:04 PM
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Nate Posted…
Thanks for the update vis10n! I happened to save a copy of that comment page prior to the shutdown (600+ entries at the time), I just did a find for "tab" in the file... 766 occurances! Also thanks for the smartypants notification, that will be installed here on webgraphics promptly.16. February 7, 2003 07:32 PM
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vis10n Posted…
My pleasure! I've been reading around on the trackbacks (needed my safari fix), and though the knee-jerk "Tabbed Browsing" response makes me ill (saying "Tabbed Browsing" is needed, without saying squat about other—perhaps more weighty matters—is short-sighted, and speaks more of a herd mentality more than anything), there were plenty of great ideas out there! I was able to post some 17 of them... in fact, if "750" really is the final number, then I guess I had the last word. But since their not available, I'll mention them here FWIW: – Auto-complete that parses URL, TITLE, and COMMENT info from both HISTORY and BOOKMARK areas. – Auto-complete that allows a user to tab from directory to directory within a URL. An example: Let's say that I have a single reference to "apple" in my browser history and bookmark listings, and it's for a movie trailer featured at Apple's Movie Trailer site (http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/phone_booth/). I type in "apple" and I get that URL. I select that URL, tab once and my cursor (|) is here: "http://www.apple.com/|". If I hit ENTER, I'm sent to the Apple home page. Hit TAB again and ENTER, and I'm here: "http://www.apple.com/trailers/|". You get the idea: finally, a single reference can be much more useful. – I don't care for the tabbed interface, as I think that it breaks the metaphor established by the HUI guidelines for viewing files and apps... that said, if some form of tabbed interface is _essential_ I prefer that Hyatt et al bring their brains to it, and really make it work—but don't make it a default setting. Also, of any tabbed interface concept, I prefer the several that use a drawer... specifically an idea, the URL for which is stuck in the closed comments over at Hyatt's blog. *ack* – I want a mute button and/or keyboard shortcut. I'm tired of ducking for cover at work when some bozo decides to foist their noise on me. – Drop the brushed metal. – Keyboard shortcut and contextual menu item for opening new windows in background. – Drag-and-drop everything. – Use favicons when available for bookmark icons. – Do for cookies what you did for bookmarks, and include some way to delete cookies (a la carte or wholesale) on a per-session basis. – Give HISTORY, BOOKMARKS, and COOKIES a respectable API (this is a new idea... but it's a great one! Stolen from Jim over at Nothing New, http://www.ibiblio.org/jimray/blog/archives/000129.html ) – STATUS BAR should be ON by default. – Tooltip pop-ups (a la MAC IE 5) for TITLE, ABBREVIATION, ACRONYM, CITE and similar data. Leave ALT data where it belongs: in broken images, and in browsers for the visually impaired. – Keep the BUG BUTTON (Wouldn't it be nice if _all_ apps had one?). – Allow for printing of rectangle selections (a la CROP functionality in Photoshop) of a web page. There were a couple others, but I don't recall. Man I hope Dave puts the comments back up in some form... or at least a digest of them. Anyway, Dave promised to read trackbacks, so let's not let the discussion end with my re-hash! : )17. February 7, 2003 07:36 PM
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vis10n Posted…
That's "I was able to post some 17 ideas" — not necessarily 17 _great_ ideas. : )18. February 11, 2003 09:36 AM
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Stuart Langridge Posted…
I appreciate that what you're looking for here is the browser to do this everywhere, but, just in case: http://www.kryogenix.org/code/browser/nicetitle/ can do this on a site-by-site basis.19. February 11, 2003 10:57 AM
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Joshua Kaufman Posted…
Very nice, Stuart! Now all it needs is rounded corners ;)20. February 11, 2003 11:03 AM
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Nate Posted…
Wow, Stuart that's great! As you mentioned, it doesn't show up in Safari, and I can't get it to show up in Mac IE 5.5 or Chimera. But on Win IE 6, Win Pheonix, and of course Moz, it's golden. Check out how nice this is: (screen-shot via win Pheonix)21. February 11, 2003 11:06 AM
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Nate Posted…
Joshua, in Moz based browsers it even has those rounded corners! (see screen shot above). I tried adding the CSS2 text-shadow property, but I guess that's not supported anywhere yet?22. February 11, 2003 11:24 AM
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Nate Posted…
Hold the phone. It's working in Safari on Stuart's Homepage! but not on the nicetitle page itself. You must doing something different on your homepage Stuart? Homepage not showing nicetitles in Mac IE 5.5 (but still degrading perfectly of course). Here's the Safari proof:23. April 15, 2003 10:17 AM
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astray Posted…
A new extension for the phoenix browser has been made which tentatively does this mouseover effect. It doesnt support all types of links, but its a start.24. April 17, 2003 08:10 PM
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Joshua Kaufman Posted…
* Tooltips per Nate's suggestion. * Subscribe to this site's RSS feed in NetNewsWire. * Any selected text or image should be draggable to the dock and opened in that app.