
Chrome 51 Arrives on Android, Officially Kills Off “Merge Tabs and Apps” - ikeboy
http://www.droid-life.com/2016/06/08/chrome-51-arrives-officially-kills-off-merge-tabs-apps/
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currywurst
I was among the folks who at first didn't care for the feature, but it quickly
grew on me. Things I noticed (perhaps useful for UX folks)

* In a default one-handed grip, it was easier to switch between tabs because the multitasking button on Android is near where one's thumb usually is. Now to switch tabs, you have to reach diagonally across the screen on top near the address bar (which is aggravated by unnaturally big phones, but that's another story)

* I am not on the dev channels, and was not particularly "in the know" about the upcoming change. So I was extremely frustrated to find one day that not only suddenly a fundamental behaviour changed, but there was no option to set it back!! Really disrespectful to the user. If I was dead-set on changing it I would put a highlight near the setting that it was going to be deprecated soon.

I then resolve to switch to Firefox on Android, and I can't believe I didn't
do it earlier. While I've made peace with the fact that "merge apps and tabs"
are gone, I found out that Firefox had a vastly superior feature set, the most
delightful of which is the "Tab Queue" feature. (E.g. when browsing in the
Twitter app, and you click on links it doesn't switch to the browser, it
queues the link in Firefox. Once you're done with Twitter, you can now switch
to Firefox and all the links are retrieved then)

~~~
unprepare
and firefox supports add ons, so i can browse the web with an ad-blocker

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EpicEng
Good riddance. Maybe others found this useful, I don't know, but all it did
for me was conflate two disparate concepts (really; tabs are not apps) and
cause clutter in what was a useful UI. It was the first thing I disabled after
switching back to Android from iOS.

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reidrac
I liked it. It felt quite natural to look for the pages in my app list,
instead of getting to the browser and then switch tabs. I guess I tend to use
more websites than native apps.

Also the new (old?) behaviour keeps the last tab open when I close the
browser, which is annoying and a step backwards in usability. It doesn't seem
to be possible to change this.

In my opinion it would have been better to leave the functionality and just
turn it off by default.

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EpicEng
My issue is that I tend to have a lot of tabs (> 5) open at once. Because apps
and tabs were combined, switching between apps became a chore as I had to
swipe through so many tabs. I like keeping them separate.

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fahrradflucht
I was very disappointed as a first saw that change pop up in Chrome Dev for
Android, but thought it was maybe a change of defaults and the option would
get put in again before the release.

Now it's not in and I think thats very sad. It just degrades the open web in
relation to native apps even more and the context switch between browser tabs
and native apps is as big as it was years ago. Why don't keep the option?

I know progressive web apps that are added to the homescreen still have that
functionality but the main idea of PWAs was that the move from a website
becoming an app should be as seamless as possible...

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currywurst
A "homescreened" PWA will still appear as a separate app though ..

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fahrradflucht
> I know progressive web apps that are added to the homescreen still have that
> functionality but the main idea of PWAs was that the move from a website
> becoming an app should be as seamless as possible...

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donretag
I love this feature. Did not care for it at first, but I quickly learned to
enjoy it.

I never update software that works, so hopefully I will enjoy this
functionality until my next phone.

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smt88
> _I never update software that works_

This is such a terrible mistake for a browser. You're missing vital security
patches. Never browse with an out-of-date browser!

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c_m_u
Yeah, gee. Thank god for the security update treadmill. Prefect excuse to
force other people to accept unwanted changes.

This is the way bills in congress work, so let's apply the same social
engineering to software.

Someone else gets to ruin my system by bundling a non-essential change with an
"essential" change. Never waste a good disaster.

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ikeboy
On the other hand it costs time and money to backport fixes to older versions.
We add feature X and remove feature Y, refactoring a bunch of code. Now we fix
a security bug. Applying that patch to the old version won't build. Someone
needs to fix that, right?

Microsoft supported XP for a long time, but that was paid. At some point it
becomes unfeasible to maintain older versions.

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icebraining
Smartphones are paid too. To me, this should be covered under the EU's
warranty laws, since it's clearly a defect of manufacturing (even if it's
_software_ manufacturing), so it should be guaranteed for a minimum of two
years.

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ikeboy
They give you updates. They don't give you updates to old versions that only
fix bugs.

Also Android/Chrome is free, so just because phones are paid doesn't mean such
laws would apply.

Phone security updates are sometimes provided for some time, actually. I know
Samsung at least went back and made new releases for abandoned phones after
stagefright.

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icebraining
_They give you updates. They don 't give you updates to old versions that only
fix bugs._

True, and that would mostly likely fulfill their obligation, though personally
I don't think I should have to accept what is essentially a new product to get
a manufacturing flaw repaired.

 _Also Android /Chrome is free, so just because phones are paid doesn't mean
such laws would apply._

Ah, with that I wholly disagree, and I expect the law to do as well. Android
(and Chrome nowadays) is clearly part of the package that I buy with the
phone, and advertised as such. That the phone OEM got it for free from Google
is irrelevant to me as the consumer; I paid for the whole thing.

~~~
smt88
Android is now supported the same way as Windows: security patches are
backported to old versions to benefit users who aren't able to upgrade.

Chrome is free and also optional. If you don't like the new features that come
with the security updates, you can easily use a different browser.

~~~
icebraining
If Chrome comes bundled, as AFAIK it currently does, it should be considered
part of the product being bought and subject to the same rules, as shown in
the ads and as the consumer clearly does.

I disagree with the EU's decision to force MS to have that browser selection
dialog, but that doesn't mean bundling should be consider a "gift" by the
manufacturer. A browser is an expected part of a current smartphone OS, and as
such they should be responsible for the one they include.

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egeozcan
And I thought that I had accidentally turned that feature off and have been
searching for a while to get it back. Really disappointing.

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Illniyar
I didn't like it or use it but it feels like a pretty major functionality to
remove.

Anyone know what is the reason behind it? Was it unpopular? A security risk?
Hard to maintain?

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xbmcuser
previously 50 recent apps were available in future version of Android 7 most
recent only so this would make all the recents chrome tabs mostly so they
removed it

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tdkl
Good.

The recent apps since Lollipop was so convoluted already, since they allowed
up to 50 items in it, which kills the convenience of having a recent app list
in the first place. If you open the recent list and the app you want isn't in
the first 7+-2 items, it'll take longer then going to the shortcut/app drawer.

That's why they got to their senses in N and limited that list to 7. [1]

Sadly we'll get that sometime next year (my phone just got offered M). But
that's another bag of dicks.

[1] [http://www.androidpolice.com/2016/05/18/android-n-
includes-t...](http://www.androidpolice.com/2016/05/18/android-n-includes-
tweak-of-recent-apps-ui-with-clear-all-button-at-top-only-7-apps-included-in-
switcher-and-quick-switch-shortcut/)

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zspitzer
I never used it, mainly because it removed the simple UI to close all tabs in
the browser

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JohnTHaller
Now if we can just get rid of different search entries appearing in task
switcher. I want to switch apps not see the complete nonsense of my search
history. I get it, you want me to use search more, but get it out of my way.

While we're at it, stop shoehorning Chrome views into the Search app and
everything else, too. The only reason for it to be there is to make it harder
for folks that use a different default browser to be able to launch it. And to
ensure that ads are shown since Chrome and Chrome views don't support ad
blocking.

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aashu_dwivedi
I really liked the feature. Is there a performance reason because of which it
was removed or is it only related to ux ?

