home Comp. literacy Grouping tabs in chrome. How to return tab groups in new versions of Mozilla Firefox. Selecting multiple tabs at once

Grouping tabs in chrome. How to return tab groups in new versions of Mozilla Firefox. Selecting multiple tabs at once

45 Mozilla no longer ships its browser with the tab group feature, arguing that too few people have used the feature.

As a result, the "tab groups" and "group your tabs" icons are no longer present in the web browser interface. Version 44 was the last where they could be seen.

In addition, the key combination Ctrl + Shift + E, which used to be responsible just for grouping, no longer leads to any actions.

In fact, a warning about the imminent disappearance of the “tab groups” function could be observed in Firefox all the last time directly in the grouping interface itself:

The “more” link there led to this official page, explaining that this feature will soon be removed from the browser, and all grouped tabs will be saved to your bookmark directory.

The grouping feature debuted in Firefox 4.0, released in the spring of 2011.

This mechanism was developed under the code names Panorama and Tab Candy by well-known usability expert Aza Raskin, who, alas, is no longer working at Mozilla.

Thanks to this technology, it was easy to separate tabs into groups that did not overlap on the tab bar. That is, only one group was visible at a time, while others could be called from a special interface.

How to get tab groups back in Firefox

Return tab grouping to Mozilla browser Firefox is possible with the Tab Groups extension. Let's clarify that this module is not an easy attempt to imitate the functionality that was previously available in a web browser. Tab Groups uses the original code for the Panorama feature from pre-Firefox versions of Firefox 45.

As a result, you will get all the opportunities that you had before. Moreover, Tab Groups should pick up the tab groups already available before switching to new versions of Firefox.

The extension is completely free and has an excellent user rating in the Mozilla catalog. After installing it, the combination Ctrl + Shift + E becomes operational again, and in the right upper corner The Group your tabs icon appears above the address bar.

However, in addition to returning the old functionality, Tab Groups also brings a little new. In the grouping interface, pay attention to the gear icon.

He leads to new page options. Indeed, they are this moment very little. For now, you can configure only hotkeys, animation display and backup.

For most of us, the browser is the most popular and most frequently used program on the computer. We use it to listen to music, watch movies, check mail and so on. And although browsers are updated almost every week, they have enough problems. One of them is not the most convenient work with a large number of tabs.

In fact, tabbed browsing is like that cat joke. You don't like cats? You just don't know how to cook them. You just need to learn how to work with tabs and use the appropriate browser features for this. And you will not be able to understand how you lived before.

Keyboard shortcuts (hotkeys)

Hotkeys are a very convenient way to manage tabs. Especially when the tabs get so tiny that they're not even easy to click on.

Ctrl+Tab- switch between tabs to the right side.
Ctrl+Shift+Tab- switching between tabs to the left side.
Ctrl + W / Cmd + W on Mac- close the active tab.

These are just a few combinations that will allow you to quickly switch between tabs. Keyboard shortcuts exist. And some of them may force you to use the keyboard instead of the mouse to manage tabs.

Remember open tabs

When you're constantly switching back and forth between your browser and another program, there's a chance you might accidentally close your browser and have to reopen everything. And it's good if you remember what you had open. A feature of the browser that allows you to remember which tabs were open before closing it can save you from all this headache.

Enable this feature and thereby free yourself from unnecessary work in the future:

Google Chrome: Settings → Start group → Continue from the same place.
Firefox: Settings → General → When Firefox starts → Show last opened windows and tabs.
Apple Safari: Settings → General → Safari opens at startup → All windows from the last session.

Add tabs to favorites

Another fast way save open tabs to work with them later is to add them to a separate bookmark folder. To do this, right-click on the tab and select "Add tabs to favorites". Item name may vary depending on different browsers, but it is easy to understand that this is exactly the item you need. As a result, a folder with the addresses of the sites you need will appear in your bookmarks. Next, right-click on this folder, select "Open all bookmarks" - all tabs are in front of us again.

Sort tabs by individual browser windows

Who said that all tabs should be in the same browser window? You can sort your tabs into different windows. For example, you can transfer all tabs that relate to one project to one browser window, and everything related to entertainment to another, and so on. Simply drag a tab to an empty spot on your desktop and a new window will open. Another way is to right-click on a link or bookmark and select "Open in new window" from the list.

Selecting multiple tabs at once

You can perform various actions not with one tab, but with several at once. But for this, you first need to select these same tabs. Hold down the Ctrl key (or Cmd on a Mac) and select the tabs you currently need. That's it, now you can close them, reload, add to bookmarks and so on.

Tab pinning

Modern browsers from good developers have a wonderful "Pin tab" feature. This is very convenient if you keep one or another tab open all the time. For example, it could be a tab with Gmail or a music service. Once you pin a tab, it will be harder to close and take up less space on your tab bar. Just right-click on the tab and select the desired item from the list.

Restoring a closed tab

Sometimes it turns out that you accidentally close a tab that you didn’t want to close at all. The hand twitched or changed its mind at the moment of closing - anything can happen. To open this tab again, you can, of course, go into your browser history and find this site. Alternatively, you can use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Shift + T (or Cmd + Shift + T on Mac in Chrome and Firefox, and Cmd + Z in Safari) to bring that tab back. You can also right-click on any tab in your browser.

Tab groups in Firefox

Almost five years ago, the developers added to Firefox browser very cool feature, which is called "Tab Groups", or "Panorama". It practically performs the trick described above. We are talking about using different browser windows for tabs. Only here all this is done more beautifully, and you do not need to produce a lot of windows. A couple of clicks, and you have already switched to work with another project or, on the contrary, have fun after work. To launch tab groups, use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Shift + E or Cmd + Shift + E on a Mac.

I hope that now your work with a large number of browser tabs will become a little easier.

Web design ,

Interfaces ,

Usability

Today we are ready to announce that the version of Yandex.Browser that we are working on as part of the Cousteau project is merging into its main beta. We know that many here use it, and now you will be able to switch between the new mode and the traditional interface.

At the end of November last year, our team for the first time publicized their vision of what Yandex.Browser will become in the future. To be honest, we did not expect that there would be so many public reviews. For comparison, the flow of suggestions and bug reports sent from Cousteau turned out to be even greater than after the release of the very first version of Yandex.Browser in 2012. It is not surprising that throughout December we were actively engaged in the analysis of your messages, which largely determined our scope of work for the coming months.

We want it to be convenient for participants in Yandex.Browser beta testing to track changes in the Kusto project and not have to use two different assemblies. And now I will talk about the results of our work on a new browser over the past month.

Disable tab grouping

One of the most popular topics that our users spoke about was the layout of the tabs. In the beta version, they will still remain at the bottom, but we are working on different options and continue to experiment. We want to talk about them separately. And today I would like to touch on the issue of grouping tabs. Moreover, many support calls were dedicated to her and allowed us to create a list of priority fixes.

We talked in detail about the ideological justification for grouping tabs last time. Now let's share with you the statistics that pushed our team to work on this feature.

Contrary to popular belief, for most users, two or three tabs are not enough for everyday life on the web. Moreover, about 10% of us open more than ten tabs for our tasks. And almost 3% use more than 20. For example, for me this is a common working condition. Do you have any idea what two or three dozen open tabs in a browser are? I know colleagues who have hundreds of tabs open.

It would be wrong to simply count the number of open tabs and, based on this data, introduce forced grouping. Based on the basic idea that sites are applications, we initially focused on grouping by domain, but without checking it was impossible to make a decision. In particular, it could happen by chance that users with 20 tabs have 20 different sites open, and there is no question of any benefit in this case. And here's what we counted:

The results showed that more than ten sites are open for 4% of users versus 10% for tabs. What does it say? The fact that grouping really makes sense for many users, but not for all. From the very beginning, we understood that there was a risk of complicating life for those who had only a few tabs open. And your appeals after the launch of the alpha confirmed the fears.

by the most simple solution there would be an option in the settings to enable/disable grouping. But the question remains: should grouping work by default? Should we focus on those who simultaneously work with two or three sites? And where is the line beyond which the grouping is definitely needed? Questions like these spur our future work. Among several options, we, for example, consider an algorithm in which the grouping would be offered to users who have overcome the threshold of N simultaneously open domains.

Background tabs

Another issue that has been confirmed through support calls has to do with opening tabs in the background - when you context menu links, select "Open in a new tab" (or click the middle mouse button). In our alpha, such pages sometimes opened inside inactive groups, and it was not at all obvious where to look for it now.

To solve this problem, it was necessary to somehow distinguish the tabs open in the background from all the others. And at the same time, select the inactive group in which such a tab appeared. I didn’t want to reinvent the wheel at all (because we really wanted to fix this situation already in the first update), so we used the well-known method - each background tab now has circle marks. Recall that in a similar way we mark those search suggestions that are formed based on the history of visits.

It would seem that the background tabs are successfully selected, it is not difficult to find them. We decided to assemble the assembly and test our solution on volunteers. There were no problems with the circle. Background tabs have become more visually noticeable. The problem lurked on the other side, and for the time being it was successfully masked by the inconvenience of finding tabs. It consists in this. If the background tab opens in an inactive group, then two clicks are required to get to the content. This is a whole click more than we are used to.

The only sane, click-free option we've come up with is to temporarily disable grouping for these tabs. You open a background tab, but it doesn't fall into the group, but stays next to it until the group is viewed or expanded.

Tab activation order

Another direction for us was the work on the order of opening tabs. Recall that at the moment, after closing the active tab, the focus goes to the tab on the right (standard logic in Chromium). Not the most ideal mechanics, we agree. But it did not cause any special problems exactly until the moment when the grouping appeared. Now, users are faced with a situation where, after closing the right-most tab, a tab from a completely different group becomes active in a group. It is not taken lightly.

Therefore, in the beta version, we have implemented a new, experimental logic that is well known to many users of the old Opera. It is not the tab on the right that becomes active, but the one that was previously used. This is not the final version yet, but it would be interesting to know the opinion of the community now

Optimization for weak computers

The graphic effects used in the new Yandex Browser work quite well (let's make allowance for the fact that yesterday it was alpha) on computers with modern video accelerators (conditionally labeled as HD). However, there is hardware that, unlike us, is not at all happy with smooth blurs and other graphical delights in the browser. We do not want to turn a blind eye to this, so we are constantly looking for ways to optimize.

At the first stage (that is, already in the current beta), Yandex.Browser will disable blur and replace it with a white fill with opacity 0.9 for devices with weak video cards (GMA). Compromise option. Not very effective, but you can already work.
There is also a third category. These are the most problematic video cards that can even be banned at the Chromium level, or the browser does not have access to work with such devices. Even the simplest opacity can't be handled with such equipment, so in this case we'll use a plain white backing.

This is what we already managed to do for the first beta. In future releases, we will try to talk about our other plans aimed at increasing productivity.

Bookmarks

From the very beginning, we did not hide the fact that we do not plan to cut bookmarks from the browser. However, they did not simply copy them from the current traditional interface to the new one. The usual bookmarks bar, placed under the address bar, does not fit into the new interface. And it's not about the design. It's not much of a problem to make it semi-transparent (although doing so would lead to difficulties in dealing with transparency in some situations). And not even that we do not have a classic address bar in this place. Another line in the header is again the path to the piling up of panels and the “striping” of the browser.

AT current versions Yandex.Browser has an option that is quite popular among users, which allows you to display bookmarks only by clicking in address bar. This way, bookmarks are just a click away and don't take up space when they're not needed. It is this experience that we applied in the new interface by moving the bookmarks to the Inside Out and the new tab.

Switching between Cousteau and traditional interface

As mentioned at the very beginning, the new beta version of Yandex.Browser allows everyone to choose the interface in which they are comfortable working. The corresponding item can be found in the main menu.

We never tire of repeating that bug reports sent to us (or just comments on Habré) matter. We listen and respond. Sometimes not as lightning fast as we all would like, but it really works.

Something else. Appearance of Cousteau