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Comment by Tomek_ | Hacker News Reader

That address field feature is a cool idea. I'd expect other browsers "copying" it soon, which would make it another item on a list entitled "Invented by Opera, popularized by others".

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I don't understand what you find "cool": not showing protocol, not showing query parameters, or both?

> Parameters at the end of web addresses are visually hidden when the address field is not focused

I think those are terrible, terrible ideas; to the best of my knowledge this behavior was pioneered by Chrome and is now growing like a cancer, under the false premise that "non-technical users don't understand urls".

How are they going to ever understand them if browsers don't show it to them??!? Hiding query parameters breaks the relation between a url and its content; now all of Google is under the same "www.google.com" url: how is that "better"?

By the same principle that "young people don't understand words" let's remove all printed words and simply print books with the same cover and the same title -- they're all "books" anyway.

This feature evokes unpleasant memories of Microsofts decision to hide file extensions and all the pain which came because of this. The only good news is that you can deactivate the feature in your preferences.

Too bad you can't do that in Chrome.

I keep a patched version of Chromium around for that very reason. All you have to do is change one line in the sources. I'll dig up the patch and send it to you once I get back on a real computer.

I don't like that they hide query string, but they've implemented hiding of protocol well (doesn't interfere with copy&paste).

I've realized that hiding of https:// actually makes sense. You could mistakenly believe that page delivered over https:// is secure, but there are several cases, when it's not true (e.g. page embedding JavaScript over plain HTTP).

A true security indicator replacing https:// in the addressbar makes more sense, and it shows secure only when connection is really secure (as far as SSL is concerned of course).

Actually I wasn't referring to the fact that they hide protocol, that is indeed questionable move. What it's cool it's how they present you an information about security level of the site - check it.

Edit: plus if this http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1921100 is true (don't have Opera 11 here to check it) then hiding protocol it's hardly a problem.

I'm sympathetic to the argument that hiding information is counter-educational. But nothing exists in a vacuum. There are serious problems to deal with, too. I suspect the concern is phishing. Consider:

  hxxp://mc564.mail.yahooo.cz/mc/welcome?.gx=1&.tm=1290173262&.rand=8a8hcjme2nb60#_pg=showMessage& sMid=13&&filterBy=&.rand=1020435964&midIndex=13&mid=1_41637_AFNv%2FNgAARb0TMWfVwycxVDDYoo&fromId=sendreceive@iso50.com&m=1_45237_AFRv%2FNgAALZZTMxQEQbt1QDuB60,1_44482_AFRv%2FNgAAX6dTMscRg7DzmBp0%2BM,1_43847_AFRv%2FNgAAWU6TMoFPgz8kG1tlus,1_43135_AFVv%2FNgAAPHWTMixWAJSDRUfECQ,1_42368_AFNv%2FNgAAEUnTMcCHAZk2EsgYvc,1_41637_AFNv%2FNgAARb0TMWfVwycxVDDYoo,1_40918_AFdv%2FNgAAOo%2FTMMVTQtEN0nYhxw,1_40277_AFdv%2FNgAAK2ETMGqmwMZ%2Fm865vA,1_39560_AFdv%2FNgAAJLQTMBzaQzIs28a2Uc,1_38916_AFJv%2FNgAAGfRTL97CgGm0yp6dBs,1_38170_AFZv%2FNgAAAK%2BTL4DxwdptRQfn90,&sort=date&order=down&startMid=0&hash=30c49f5b9f61273beed1953ae7674c2f&.jsrand=5917415

How likely are you to notice the problems with this URL? I'm pretty sure I wouldn't. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that non-technical users consider the address field a sort of write-only space; they type something comprehensible in there, and the browser destroys it. The simplified address field with the bold domain name is a lot easier to read, and that probably increases the chances that it will be read, rather than ignored. The full URL is just one click away.

Enter the URL with two spaces before it please, to place it in a code box.

It's changing the layout.

Sorry about that. But that's interesting, isn't it? The URL is so unwieldy that the site and/or the typical web browser cannot handle it properly. In fact, it's so long that most of it is already invisible on a typical screen anyway.

All modern browsers deal with phising without destroying information; just alert the user that the site they're visiting is not what it claims to be.

If users don't look at the address bar and don't understand urls, how are they going to tell something is amiss when they visit the following domains (all available at the time of writing):

- gnail.fr - gnail.me - gmail.se.com - gmail.uk.net - yahooo.uk.com - yahooo.eu.com

Only showing the domain does not help the non-technical user: you can have a fake domain look quite legitimate to the non-technical eye.

Hiding part of the URL is what every browser currently does, when the URL gets long enough. Does that count as "destroying information?" The Opera alpha shows the whole URL when you click on the address field.

I think I'd be more likely to notice typos like "yahooo" or "gnail" with the new display method, without the noise of a thousand-character URL surrounding them. That is by no means the be-all and end-all of anti-phishing technology. It's just giving me one more chance to see something that might be amiss.

Why should people have to understand URLs? Do most people understand how the engine of a car works? No. They just want to get from A to B. Most people don't care.

Hiding query parameters hides yet another thing that's mostly unreadable anyway.

Comparing this to "young people don't understand words" is quite silly. Printed words are important. The message is important. And in fact, language is constantly being simplified, and has been simplified throughout history. Just like the address bar in Opera is now simplified.

The way Opera hides http:// is a nice touch (edit: because they avoided copy&paste problem that Chrome has), but such addressbar style has been pioneered by Firefox (extensions) and Chrome.

It's not. It breaks copy and paste.

Have you tried it? it doesn't.. when the focus is on the address bar it reverts to the whole URL.

Then they fixed it since last month.

This feature didn't exist last month -- it was added publicly on november 17th, in other words two days ago.

Dunno about Chrome but I don't have the copy and paste problem in Chromium 9.0.584.0 (66224) Ubuntu 10.10. Since Chrome is released from the same base, either it should already be there or would be there in the future releases.

The problem people complain about is that when you try to copy domain name alone (e.g. to ssh to it) http:// gets copied unexpectedly. It's a feature that for some is a bug.

Opera avoided the issue by showing full URL when you focus addressbar, so you see what you're copying and can edit protocol part.

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