Category Archives: Bad Design

Firefox 3: Why Tabs Are Upside Down?

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Installing the new Firefox 3 was an easy task. The browser seems to work, on a Mac, better than the previous version. Although that, Firefox still has some usability issues. I don’t want to make a complete review but I would like to highlight the first issue I noticed: using the default skin, the tabs are upside down and not linked to the page they refer.

Tabs should be attached to pages. This is not a new idea, as you can see on the picture tabs has been used in this way for ages. When I have doubts about a new design I tend to look for ideas in the real world…

 

Files with tabs

Picture by Takashi

 

The Firefox 3 Approach

I think that Mozilla was just trying to copy the Apple Safari look without thinking if the Apple solution was perfect. In my opinion this tab design is not going to be a problem at all for old users. On the other side it could be troublesome for inexperienced ones: They just don’t notice that those are tabs.

 

Tabs are hanging from the Bookmarks Toolbar:

 Firefox 3 Tabs A

 

Changing tabs:

Firefox 3 Tabs Example

 

Tabs should be linked to the page, not to the menu. A simple mental model…

Firefox 3 Tabs Example B

 

Another Nokia Flop: The New Music Store

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I got excited when I received an email from Nokia announcing the new Nokia Music Store. OK, I didn’t get excited at all, Nokia has been sending me promises of good service for a long time. Without success.

I have been an unhappy Nokia E61 user for a year or so (they are still selling that model). The interface is horrible and the whole telephone is very slow. I managed to load music into my phone only once, I never did it again. OK, OK, Nokia is the number one phone maker but that might be because they are making a good business in the third world selling cheap phones.

The new Music Store

Designing with standards and for everybody should be something that customers and designers themselves should fight for. When I tried to see the new Nokia Music Store a beautiful "Unsupported Browser" message was displayed. GREAT. The only system combination that works with it is the Windows-Internet Explorer one.    

"Nokia Music does not currently support the Mozilla Firefox (Mac OS X) browser on your operating system"

Nokia Music Store Screenshot

My point

This is not what customers want, specially here in Europe where Firefox has a 30% market share, in some EU countries with market share higher then 40% (as reported by Ars Technica in January 2008). In a perfect world we would design for standard browsers, but the world is not perfect. Making a service available for different browsers is something that it’s going to affect the usability of it.

We are not talking about a startup, we are talking a huge company. So why not spending some more money to make products available for all?

The Browser War and the Microsoft Arrogance

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OK, somebody does not understand how the internet works. This is not new, but Microsoft is digging his own grave (well, I hope). It makes me so angry to see things like this:

Web Messenger Browser Error

 

So, if users want to use the online version of the MSN Web Messenger, they have to use MS Internet Explorer. This not very user friendly, Microsoft!