Thank you for your great comment.

I think you are right about the order of elements (app icons -> tabs -> page). That makes a lot of sense now. But I don’t know why I have the feeling that this new order on Safari 4 could be the preparation for something bigger: what if web sites would be allowed to customized the browser’s icons and controls to make web services/sites look like applications? In that case an arrangement like this would make sense:

[tabs tabs tabs]
[browser icons and controls, website-specific icons and controls]
[web page, content]

Of course, I’m just imagining the future…

Thanks a lot for you comment!

Alex

Good points. I believe you are right: tabs on top of the ‘page’ make most sense. I would hesitate to reference the users ‘mental models’ in this context, however, because (clearly) tabs in browsers(!) have mostly (always for 99% of people) NOT been on top.

The result is that most people today would have to ‘search’ for the tabs in safari 4. Even I had to get used to it (and I have been using a myriad of browsers, including Chrome, for a long time). So while it is true that people would have no doubts about the location of tabs on folders, I feel they would still look for tabs in browsers below(!) the addres bar.

People get used to it quickly, I guess, though.

One other thing: while I see the logic behind ‘tabs on top of pages’ I wonder if the location bar should not be on top. Isn’t the location bar a Interface Control, belonging to the application, rather than part of the specific page? Of course the URL _in_ the bar is specific for the page, but the bar itself (just as the home-button and bookmarks button) belongs to the browser application and not(!) to the current page. I would think they should, therefor, be detached from the page.

More logical would be:

[application icons and controls, including addres/search/awesome bar]
[tabs tabs tabs]
[page]

Anyway, good thoughts!