Google Chrome, A Testament to Hubris

Before I begin with my argument, let me say that I generally like Google Chrome (or more correctly, Chromium, the open-source release). It’s the only reasonably responsive open-source (not Opera) browser for tabbed-browsing freaks on Linux, the minimalist UI and “prevent amateur authors from cluttering things” extension API work very nicely to keep things clean yet functional, and I love the little touches like extending the active areas of edge widgets like scrollbars and the tab bar all the way to the edge of the screen in maximized windows.

I also agree that, to make progress, you have to experiment. However, when the Chrome devs start making not-so-smart changes, ignoring mass-complaint by the users of their “Dev Channel” releases, not even compromising with a simple checkbox, and marking well-starred issues as WontFix, they start to approach the level of arrogance and hubris I once thought reserved for the developers of The GIMP. (They’re not quite there since, in my experience, GIMP developers will also insult you or dismiss valid complaints as rude before setting RESO INVALID or RESO WONTFIX)

Here are a few of the more controversial changes, to put it politely, which they have forced on Chrome users in the last few months:

• Chrome Linux single click does not select all (An “experiment” that has now lasted roughly 6 months, proven a bit divisive in the early-adopter community, and received neither the requested checkbox nor a satisfying response from the devs.)
• Type-ahead-find [2] (Apparently, the devs feel keybinding purity is more important than users… and “/” without modifiers is impure)
• Warn when closing with multiple tabs open (Apparently data loss is preferable to modal dialogs with “remember my choice” checkboxes)
• URL bar no longer shows http:// (A pointless nod to space-constrained cellphone address bars which has caused various regressions… including some not mentioned in the bug tracker)
  • It makes novice web developers more likely to produce broken links
  • It makes life more difficult for professional web developers
  • It’s not that different from the old “change for change’s sake” that UI design best practices warn against.

…and that doesn’t even cover the many issues that should be trivial fixes but have languished for months or even years… presumably while the UI change reviews required by Google are continually de-prioritized in favor of whatever it is that the devs actually care about. (eg. native RSS support, reliable middle-click, debugged pop-up blocker, file associations, working blur()/focus(), download completion protection, a comfortable download shelf [1] [2] [3], and various others.

I’m not saying they should do things my way, but I find it, at the very least, insulting to be forced to do things their way without so much as an about:config or hard-to-find checkbox.

To be perfectly honest, for all its flaws, if Firefox 4.x can provide compact toolbars and a properly responsive GUI on Linux, I’ll switch back in a heartbeat. It may be a messy free-for-all with an extension system based on fragile monkey-patching and a rendering engine that’s more sumo wrestler than rocket, but at least it doesn’t presume to tell me how to use my own browser.

Update: As I mentioned in one of the following comments, another reason this really gets to me is the condescension, arrogance, and hypocrisy of claiming to make these changes “for the user” and then implicitly qualifying it with “We know what you want better than you do”. There’s a reason I don’t like Apple, there’s a reason I don’t like Microsoft, there’s a reason I don’t like the Apple fanboys in charge of GNOME and Ubuntu UI design, and now it looks like I also have a reason to not like Google… especially given the good arguments for reverting and the convoluted excuses against reverting that I’m seeing on the issue tracker entry for the removal of http:// from the omnibar.

Update 2: And, in what seems like an admission of defeat to me, the Google Chrome devs have now marked the issue entry for the removal of http:// read-only. In my experience, that’s the corporate equivalent of  “Ohh, nothing’s going my way. Mom!”

Update 3: While Google still seems to be convinced that their “we know you better than you do” approach to UI design is correct, they are not completely immune to reason. According to the Chrome 5.0.375.17 ChangeLog, they’ve temporarily reverted “http:// truncation, star icon, etc…”. Their official stance is “We are currently examining ways to address the usability issues that were raised and plan to reintroduce in a future release” though, so I doubt they’ll be willing to admit that stripping http:// on a non-cellphone browser is inherently a dumb idea.

Google Chrome, A Testament to Hubris by Stephan Sokolow is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.