Re: My usability experience - Asa Dotzler should be fired

On 2011-08-17 02:07, Petter Andersson wrote:
> Firefox 4.0, IMO, did bit of
> the same. I see nothing wrong with old Back/Forward/Reload/Stop/Home
> arrangement, with tabs below address bar. (Actually, tabs above
> address bar is less efficient arrangement to anyone who has back/
> forward buttons in their mouse; such person has no need to reach for
> back/forward buttons, but tabs get more/most frequently accessed and
> "on top" is simply a slowdown at that point.)

(While this is off-topic in this particular thread, it's on-topic in the 
usability newsgroup, so I'll respond anyway.)

 From a usability point of view, I beg to differ. With tabs on top, you 
can just reach for the top edge of the screen (assuming the window is 
maximized, which most browser windows are for power users). This is far 
easier than pointing precisely where the tab strip is, even if it's a 
few pixels closer to the web page with tabs under the toolbars.

You can read more about this here: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitts%27s_law#Success_and_implications

"Edges and corners of the computer monitor (e.g., the location of the 
Start button in Microsoft Windows and the menus and Dock of Mac OS X) 
are particularly easy to acquire with a mouse, touchpad or trackball 
because the pointer remains at the screen edge regardless of how much 
further the mouse is moved, thus can be considered as having infinite 
width.[5][6] This doesn't apply to touchscreens, though."

- David