

Facebook drops the comment button, allows users to edit replies  - m4tt
http://thenextweb.com/facebook/2011/03/16/facebook-drops-the-comment-button-allows-users-to-edit-replies/

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tuhin
I was having the exact discussion with a friend yesterday of what the default
behaviour in real time should be.

My friend was of the opinion that it should be Enter to post and "Shift+Enter"
to add a new line. What facebook did today basically.

My stand was the oppposite. Shift+Enter for a new comment and enter for new
line.

The reason being that even if I press enter thinking it would post my comment,
the error handling (forgiveness to the user) is minimal and I can either click
the button or be informed that to post I need shift + Enter.

However if I do it the way facebook does and press enter thinking it would
take me to a new line without me realising that I posted a comment that is
half of what I wanted to say.

Lesson: _Let you interface be forgiving and give it priority over simplicity._

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dfischer
Usability wise, it makes a lot more sense to have "enter" be a new line.
That's how it works in any textarea and document. We're trained to naturally
expect that. Enter to submit only makes sense on one line inputs. Anything
that resembles a text area should have shift + enter to submit(or control +
enter). This is most intuitive.

~~~
allwein
>Usability wise, it makes a lot more sense to have "enter" be a new line.

I disagree. The paradigm they're using here isn't that of word processing a
document, but rather quick text conversations. In pretty much every chat/IM
program I've ever used, "enter" == "send", and shift+enter == newline.

~~~
tuhin
Exactly! Dow you want the conversations to be one liners (witty or shallow) OR
do you want people to have meaningful conversations?

Assumption: You cannot _always_ have meaningful conversation with one liners.

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khafra
I think physical keyboards should come with a "post/submit" key separate from
the "newline" key, like the iPhone keyboard does.

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timerickson
I'm surprised the keyboard has lasted so long in nearly the same state. Some
notable exceptions are the remapping of function keys on Apple keyboards, and
the brilliant reuse of the caps lock key as a search key on Google's Chrome OS
netbooks.

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beaumartinez
Why? Does this solve a perceived usability issue? It's just going to confuse
its users.

When in a multiline text field, pressing Enter should add a new line. (If
comment fields where single-line text fields, however, I'd understand the
change.)

~~~
endtime
>Does this solve a perceived usability issue?

Editing, yes. When I leave a comment and see that I made a typo, I have to
delete it and repost it, by which time someone has often already replied.

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Nemisis7654
I don't quite like the hitting Enter to post. Though, I can deal with that. I
do, however, like how we can essentially edit our posts. That was something
that always frustrated me with Facebook comments.

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hughguiney
It's horrible for usability. If you don't have JavaScript on, you lose the
ability to submit comments entirely. Not that Facebook was very usable with JS
off to begin with, but still.

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alexknight
I'm not one to complain about UI changes, but I truly think they'll need to
tweak this. In fact, it should be the reverse IMHO. Shift + enter= submit and
enter= carriage return.

