September 25th, 2010
Theme Status for Firefox 4
It has been a while since I posted a theme status update. Things have come a long way since then.
I considered trying to list all the awesomeness that has happened in the theme space over the last few months. However that would be a very long list indeed!
Instead I am posting some screenshots below of the theme progress to date.
Theme Status
In its current state the theme has most of the major bits in place and they now just await tweaks and polish.
In an effort to advance the polish stage I have updated the Timeline/Milestone page of the theme project wikipage. This page now contains a list of bugs that still need to be fixed before Firefox 4. The list is sorted in order of priority and anything that is listed above “Lower priority bugs” is considered required. Anything below that is high priority polish. I am attempting to keep it current with regards to ownership and status to the best of my knowledge.
The list is not comprehensive and there are other outstanding theme bugs that are not listed there. I am trying to keep the scope to required bugs and the most glaring issues that need polish. It is also not a static list. I add new bugs as I find them. If anyone see anything that’s missing please feel free to let me know.
It also contains screenshots/mockups to help reduce ambiguity. They are slightly out of date due to some recent landings and decisions but will be updated shortly.
Linux Status
The Linux theme got off to a slow start primarily due to constrained resources but is now picking up steam. We have also had to dial back our plans in certain areas like titlebar drawing because of technical constraints.
Recently the new tab styling landed and new toolbar buttons are in progress. There is also an implementation of the Firefox Button for Linux underway.
This is still an area that could still use some additional help with the current set of bugs as well as future bugs that are likely to crop up.
Theme Screenshots Then (early-May) and Now (4b7pre)
What’s Next?
Continue tracking theme progress and working on all polish all the time. Well maybe not all the time. There are still several new features that need design work like the upcoming tab-modal prompts.
Thanks to everyone who has contributed to the new theme work! It has come a long way and what has been accomplished so far is truly amazing.
Update: Jason Fragoso was kind enough to translate this post into Belorussian
This entry was posted on Saturday, September 25th, 2010 at 1:04 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.
The work so far has been brilliant. I hope these bugs can be fixed before RC1.
The ubuntu screenshots should be updated with the new Light Themes that are coming in 10.10. (http://bit.ly/9KS8qz).
Anyway i think would be best for Firefox to implement an option that lets the user choose to have the same style in all Operative Systems. (omiting the OS’ effects like Aero).
Like in Chrome and Opera.
That amazing work, well done guys.
Great work! Can you provide an about:config entry to relocate the progress line of the active tab from location bar to the top of the active tab? Its disconcerting when you select a partially loaded tab only to find the progress line suddenly disappeared (to the location bar). An about:config entry similar to the close button option will be adequate.
Good job. On Linux theme, the tabs may be slightly more spaced, like on Mac OS. Also, why the tab listing icon appears as a refresh button?
So are there no longer plans to unify the address bar and search bar akin to Chrome? I recall seeing that change in earlier mockups, but it doesn’t appear in the current mockups on the Mozilla Wiki. I’m really pushing for this change, having both bars is cluttering and unnecessary.
[5] That’s Sync icon.
Konstantino.
Having two bars is imperative for drag and drop behavior, and it’s really hard to easily select different search engines. Furthermore, for users with BBN enabled, the search bar really needs to be an independent entity.
On top of that, there are plans to make the search bar tab dependent. I really wouldn’t hope, if I were you, to ever see Firefox with an unified bar. Not only is it an astronomic pain in the ass, but it’s totally out of line with the proposed development path.
I still don’t see why the orange blob can’t be replaced with a more discreet square’ish Firefox icon, so the tabs can be next to it at all times. The titlebar is *such* a waste of space. Even Opera understands that, and they pretty much invented UI bloat.
Having one bar flies in the face of usability (that means user friendliness) in many aspects.
1. Redirection, Phishing & Privacy are all issues after page load.
2. Overloading UI element with actions that conflict but appear to simplify things.
3. I’m not going to go on and on. That’s enough to say no to it.
Anyone who tells you it’s better either has something to gain or can’t tell you why in Mac OS X Finder you can’t cut a file with Cmd + X — in other words they’re not an expert. Disclaimer: I don’t use a Mac so don’t invalidate what I’m saying just because you may assume bias.
Everybody seems to think they are professionals and that User Interfaces are meant to be *minimal and with no /clutter/*. It’s about looks, it’s about psychology, interaction blah blah I just hope people listen….
The reason Google and Microsoft did it is they have search engines and didn’t think of what COULD be done about making things easier for users while keeping 2 bars, so as you can see there is a conflict of interest — it’s not better for users.
to Tiago Sá
what is BBN?
One more nod to the anti-unified search/location bar club. It is false simplicity:
http://www.usabilitypost.com/2010/09/24/false-simplicity/
The Linux theme development for FF4 has appeared very slow and almost secretive. Planet Mozilla hasn’t had a single post about the Linux theme in months.
This is in stark contrast to what happened with FF3 Linux theme. There was a lot of enthusiasm and it seemed like developers were trying to genuinely get users involved with its design by frequently posting blog updates about it.
Please don’t keep the users in complete darkness.
i think the themes look great, the only theme i don’t like so much is the windows theme with tabs-on-top. I mean why the baby-blue color? make it glass like when the tabs are under the adress bar!
Is the tear-off tab animation still underway?
Also, something that could be cool is to have the name of the tab group (if applicable) on the name of the window, above the tabs, so if I were looking at this page in a tab group called Design, it would say “Theme Status for Firefox « Chromatic Pixel (Group: Design).” The words inside parentheses could be lighter, maybe like the iWorks suite.
iWork ’09 Pages: http://cl.ly/2eav
[...] pengguna Windows sahaja, malah termasuk juga untuk para pengguna Linux dan juga Mac. Kini, ianya diperkatakan yang mana rekabentuk Firefox 4.0 ini sudah pun hampir selesai, dan hanya diperkemaskan sedikit [...]
[...] designer Stephen Horlander posted a few screenshots, offering us insights on just how far the UI redesign of Firefox 4.0 has [...]
Hey!
Looking forward to see some new GUI in Firefox!
But I wanna know what wallpaper that has been used in the screenshots?
Wall.1: http://www.stephenhorlander.com/images/blog-posts/incontent-ui/win7-preferences-base.jpg
Wall.2: http://www.stephenhorlander.com/images/blog-posts/incontent-ui/win7-neterror.jpg
Thanx
//Poma.
That is just something I made for the mockups. I will pull it out and post it when i get a chance.
Stephen,
May I ask your email? To avoid spam, I’ll just ask if it is *username*(at)mozilla(dot)org or the same except replace “org” with “com”.
*username* from here https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox/Team/whois
SlugO, there is a GTK issue holding Mozilla back with the Firefox Menu. Mockups are being worked on.
about the tab groups, well it’s nothing new at all. in fact, the firefox 4.0 version of tab groups, Panorama, is worse! in firefox 3.6 there’s an addon called Tab group manager that has the name of each tab group on a separate line above the tabs. howevver it doesn’t work properly in firefox 4.0 beta!
@Stephen: Thanx mate!
Loving these new themes.
Minor detail – are you still planning to curve the bottoms of tabs in the Mac theme? IMO they look better and smoother curved, but the theme still looks great anyway
@Stephen: how’s it going with the wallpaper?
Stephen says:
2010/10/13 at 10:09 am
“That is just something I made for the mockups. I will pull it out and post it when i get a chance.”