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Comment by thechriswalker | Hacker News Reader

I'm just going to comment on the first aspect of this, the "Merge Tabs and Apps" option.

The first thing I do with the "Merge Tabs and Apps" is to disable it and use the in browser tab switcher.

I usually have many tabs open and I usually have many apps open. Merging the two lists just creates more noise in the app switcher. Imagine if they did this on desktop and suddenly alt-tab gave me (right now) an extra 26 things to switch through! I don't even think I am a heavy open-tabber.

My non-techie spouse wanted me to change it back immediately after the update with no prompting from me. I'm sure some people must prefer it but I find it way too busy in the switcher.

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> The first thing I do with the "Merge Tabs and Apps" is to disable it and use the in browser tab switcher.

That was also my reaction. However I started to wonder "Maybe it's just a experience-reinforced habit to mentally separate the content of the web and content of the other apps?" After all it's not the only possible paradigm. Computers used to be simple terminals and current web apps trend resembles that. Just think about Chrome OS. For me (a a person who has spent most of his life in local files, directories and applications realm) both Chrome OS and browser tabs mixed with other apps seem to be weird, unnatural and cumbersome. But for someone without the baggage of such experiences, this solution could actually appear more useful and logical.

Tabs are way more transitory. Their lifetime is pretty limited in that I will usually close them after I read its content. Apps are slightly more permanent. Also, on a more practical side, it is currently way faster to switch tabs because of those useful touch gestures in Chrome.

For me it's the opposite. Apps are transitory, tabs are long-lived.

The first thing I did is disable it too. This article worries me because it sounds like this is the direction they're going in, and maybe that option won't exist in the future.

The problem with the merged approach is that tabs and apps aren't equivalent, and this way you get a problem with 'losing' tabs in a way you're never going to with an app.

For pretty much everything else, one running app in the switcher maps to one icon in the menu. You're never going to 'lose' an app because it's always on your homescreen as well. You never have to go through the switcher you can always locate the program. Tabs though are ephemeral, and are multiple instances of a single installed app.

If I open a page to read, then get distracted by a facebook notification, I might forget it's there. With a proper tab switcher, I will rediscover it. With the merged approach, I'll probably never see it again (I don't know what actually happens here, does it eventually disappear?). There's no discovery in the process like there is with a normal app.

Thankyou I didn't know you could revert back to the old behaviour

Oh, gosh, I didn't know either, what a relief. Well, the old one wasn't a log better, but a bit more usable (tab count, and [+] to open a new tab).

I never had the reflex to use the omnibox as an url bar and wished the main screen icons would allow some kind of contextual menu (as in win7+), swiping on it would give me option to open a new tab etc etc.

TIL

Agreed - android app tabs is already an ever-growing sprawling wasteland of old google searches. Dumping browser tabs in there isn't helpful.

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