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Comment by Wowfunhappy | Hacker News Reader

And now my address bar expands on click, because browser.urlbar.update1 was removed from about:config. I knew this day was coming, but I'm still not happy it's here.

The movement is distracting, and the alignment of the bar's expanded state is terrible. There's a reason most graphic design follows a grid system.

We need a way to turn this off. I realize the old about:config flag was tied to a legacy code pathway, but now Mozilla should implement a new flag. I don't think that's an unreasonable ask.

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I'll probably try fixing that horrible location bar improvement with some custom userChrome.css https://www.userchrome.org/megabar-styling-firefox-address-b... I already removed some unused items from context menu and it feels great. Sadly, userChrome.css modifications are considered "legacy" and probably one day will be removed.

Why can't we have customizable browser UI? I'd prefer Firefox to be more like KDE and less than GNOME (feature and configuration wise). Early versions of Opera had amazing customization options, and now - all browsers are same-ish.

Do you know if there's a way to specify custom userChrome in AutoConfig[1]? I rely on that to keep my customizations consistent across machines—I really don't want this to be a part of my profile.

[1] https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/customizing-firefox-usi...

Great minds think alike. My userChrome.css now looks like this: https://pastebin.com/L0PWz5BG

Note that this also removes the search stuff from the dropdown list, which may or may not be what you want (I prefer the separate search bar).

edit: depending on context, the

    .urlbarView-row:first-of-type { display: none !important }

rule does not necessarily remove the right thing; I can live with that, but your mileage may vary...

I had to go ahead and make a userChrome.css because I couldn't take it anymore. This was the best one (although I did remove .urlbarView-row:first-of-type), so thanks for that. Still looks kind of messy, unfortunately, but an improvement!

It's really obtrusive. It takes up too much space, perhaps only by 2 pixels on each side or so, but it's too much, the contrast is too large, the outline is too heavy, and the a m o u n t o f w h i t e s p a c e is plain annoying.

Why do they persist in these ugly design shenanigans?

I suspect a lot of this is about making it easier to use with touch input. Which doesn't mean I like it, but I can understand why they're doing it.

How does this benefit touch input? It expands after clicking—the tap target hasn't changed.

I was mostly thinking about the amount of whitespace between list items. Makes it easier to hit the right one.

I don't find it that obtrusive and it's likely it would have taken me a while to notice it if it wasn't pointed out in this version and in 76 threads.

When I click it I also get the address bar drop-down with other common addresses in it, which is many many times larger than the small expansion of the address bar - unless I am missing the gripe here.

I don't know why it was needed to expand like that, but it certainly doesn't seem like an egregious use of space to me.

After having lived with this turned on for about a month I am happy to report that it doesn't really bother me at all any more now. In the first week or two it just seemed pointless to me, but over time I actually started using the thing more and more.

It's definitely not a massive improvement and I'm not sure if I'd have added it if I had had the choice but it may be worth just giving it a chance.

There will always be people who swear they never get used to it. Truth is, our brains are experts at getting used to things. Specially little style tweaks. I don't love this one, but it honestly took me a day or two to stop caring.

And that doesn't mean the change is good! Our brains also get used to bad smells, after we've been around them for long enough. But newcomers will notice, and the air will still seem fresher when we step outside.

> It's definitely not a massive improvement and I'm not sure if I'd have added it if I had had the choice but it may be worth just giving it a chance.

I mean, it's not like I have a choice now.

Yeah, it's definitely not worth dealing with weird hacks just to get rid of it. In the first week or so it bothered me too, then it seemed pointless but I didn't care and after I while I actually started using it.

I agree - I thought it was horrible at first (actually, I thought something was broken at first), but I have grown to like it. Sure it can be tweaked a bit but overall I think this is a good move.

Enough is enough. I just downgraded to 76.0.1 and it should be good enough for a long time. Here is what I did on MacOS:

  1) Uninstall Firefox
  2) Install v76.0.1: brew cask install https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask/40b6b69674d6a068105059668163476f21d94258/Casks/firefox.rb
  3) /Applications/Firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox --allow-downgrade
  4) Quickly disable auto update in Preferences
  5) Be happy with the old bar ;)

Now, v77 is already "Install Pending" in "Show Update History", but it can be ignored. But still, does anyone know how to remove it being pending?

You should consider moving to Firefox ESR instead, so you'll still get security updates. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/switch-to-firefox-exten...

It won't be good forever, but it will last longer at least.

https://github.com/Aris-t2/CustomCSSforFx might be of interest for you.

AIUI, you can set the amount of items shown to 0 in about:config, and have what amounts to a non-expanding URL bar. It's not perfect, but it's a viable workaround.

That sounds like you're talking about the dropdown menu that shows up below the URL bar, but the problem is the URL bar itself expands outside of its bounding box when it gets focus.

I'm not quite sure what you mean because I've not used the default Firefox skin for a long time. You can change almost every aspect of the Firefox UI by editing your userChrome.css file, for which there are tutorials online. If you need some help figuring this out I could check it out later

FWIW I quite like it. I'm not sure your dislike is universal, and tbh your comment feels a little https://xkcd.com/1172/ :-)

I don't doubt that every change will have some detractors—but that isn't a reason to shout down all complaints. "It's just a vocal minority—most users like it!" Well, maybe that's true, and maybe it isn't—we'll never know, because this isn't the sort of thing you can measure with analytics. All you can do is listen to feedback.

Right now, my comment is sitting at the top of this HN thread, even though we're several updates out from when the design change was first introduced. There's similar outcry over on Reddit. I think it's safe to extrapolate that a significant enough number of people dislike the expanding bar to at least warrant a hidden config flag.

For sure it is valuable feedback for Mozilla, but honestly as a long term user of Firefox and based on following various controversies and criticism my aggregate opinion is that many Firefox users often chose the strangest arguments.

A pinch of how "linux is not about choice"[1] would improve the discourse around Firefox.

I understand that many choices Mozilla made are dubious and that the browser is one of the most important pieces of software on a modern computer... still that xkcd looked quite relevant

[1] http://www.islinuxaboutchoice.com/

You're right—what Mozilla should really, ideally do, is revert back to the old behavior, with no option to re-enable the new one. :)

Just about any other design would be fine, actually; I'm not married to the old one. No other browser has a URL bar I find particularly offensive.

I would bet a very large sum of money that if you sat every person in the world down in front of two computer screens, and let them play with both URL bar designs side-by-side, a large majority would say they prefer the old design. Not everyone, to be sure—humanity will never agree on what is most aesthetically pleasing—but most. That is why the modern field of graphic design focuses on grids systems and consistent spacing and margins—because most people find them appealing. (Not even to mention the other issues around covering the bookmarks and tab bars.)

If I seem a bit overly worked up about this, it's because working in the graphic design industry has made me very sensitive to poorly-aligned visuals, in the same way type designers become sensitive to bad kerning. And I live in my web browser.

I'll eventually adapt, as most people will. That does not mean this is a good change.

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