Comments on: Basing the Design of History on the User’s Memory http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/ User Experience Design at Mozilla Thu, 21 Aug 2008 21:45:35 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6 By: dzieci http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-13417 dzieci Fri, 07 Sep 2007 13:52:20 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-13417 On my site Firefox users are 50% monthly traffic. On my site Firefox users are 50% monthly traffic.

]]> By: Aaron Strontsman http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-5985 Aaron Strontsman Mon, 04 Jun 2007 15:36:47 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-5985 What I'd really like for history would be page-title shortening, Firefox could eg figure out that all page titles on your blog start with "Alex Faaborg - >> " (in other cases pages end like that, now it'd shrink this from special chars (" - >> ") and only present the page's title. This works for a lot of pages, although you might run into problems where pages contain more than one dash (subtitles). Another thing which might be helpful would be presenting the h1 headline underneath the page title (like in grey or sth.). In my opinion, it'd also be great if Firefox remembered the structure of a page and could display, so you'd find a certain chapter of a page faster (I always remember the headline for a chapter I found interesting). Well, that probably leads too far, but might make a nice extension. What I’d really like for history would be page-title shortening, Firefox could eg figure out that all page titles on your blog start with “Alex Faaborg - >> ” (in other cases pages end like that, now it’d shrink this from special chars (” - >> “) and only present the page’s title. This works for a lot of pages, although you might run into problems where pages contain more than one dash (subtitles).
Another thing which might be helpful would be presenting the h1 headline underneath the page title (like in grey or sth.).

In my opinion, it’d also be great if Firefox remembered the structure of a page and could display, so you’d find a certain chapter of a page faster (I always remember the headline for a chapter I found interesting). Well, that probably leads too far, but might make a nice extension.

]]> By: Jay Tuley http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-870 Jay Tuley Wed, 21 Feb 2007 04:53:19 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-870 Hey this is great! In 2003 at U of I, we also designed a history user interface (w/functional prototype) based on user memory, (as Seen on Slashdot:<a href="http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/04/03/31/0513245.shtml?tid=126&tid=185&tid=95" rel="nofollow">Making A Better Browser History</a>) <blockquote> "1. Specific actions that the user takes" </blockquote> I think your idea of labeling the starting points based on the initial action to what they saw is really novel and just a nice touch in general. Although we didn't label our starting points,we similarly created groupings based on those same starting points (typed in a link,clicked a bookmark, initiating a new google search), however inside that grouping we created a hierarchy based on other actions as we would branch when you use the back button and then clicked a new link or used the open link in tab or window). Branching probably isn't the most important thing, but it certainly can be useful for mapping what you see to what you did and certainly help at picking out the right page. The degree it helps does seem to be based on the type of browsing(such as researching online you are more likely to branch a lot). <blockquote> "2. The visual appearance of what the user is looking at" </blockquote> We used big thumbnails in our study, but we didn't test small. We kept it to just what the user saw, specifically the last view of the page the user saw before leaving it, however theoretically the top of the webpage is may be the most distinguishing and thus possibly more memorable, but then again you certainly can click a link to a new page with an anchor and never have seen the top. <blockquote> "3. “The page said ____”" </blockquote> In our user study, we found this to be the most important memory aspect in terms of webpages. Slashdot looks the same today, yesterday, everyday, you would probably access it the same way too (type it, bookmark it), but the content is what is different. Not to mention if you can't remember anything about what the page said or was about, why would you be looking for it? We had summaries generated in addition to indexing the pages so you could filter your history in real-time by content, thus displaying only the groupings that pertain to what you are looking for. It was an important detail that the filtering only weeded out whole groups but not individual pages. All nodes in those groupings that had relevant nodes would find their irrelevant nodes subtly smaller and de-saturated, that way you can both search to find your target page and single it out, while still having the ability to search for how you got there with your target page still visible. <blockquote> "4. Today, yesterday, a long time ago…" </blockquote> While you probably aren't going to zero in on a page by dates beyond yesterday, but keeping it chronological though does help with associating what you see to what you did. Chronology may help you pick the right page in the list if you have the ability to distinguish between when you visited a site 1 week ago and 3 weeks ago and you can remember that you want the second visit. Hey this is great! In 2003 at U of I, we also designed a history user interface (w/functional prototype) based on user memory, (as Seen on Slashdot:Making A Better Browser History)

“1. Specific actions that the user takes”

I think your idea of labeling the starting points based on the initial action to what they saw is really novel and just a nice touch in general.

Although we didn’t label our starting points,we similarly created groupings based on those same starting points (typed in a link,clicked a bookmark, initiating a new google search), however inside that grouping we created a hierarchy based on other actions as we would branch when you use the back button and then clicked a new link or used the open link in tab or window). Branching probably isn’t the most important thing, but it certainly can be useful for mapping what you see to what you did and certainly help at picking out the right page. The degree it helps does seem to be based on the type of browsing(such as researching online you are more likely to branch a lot).

“2. The visual appearance of what the user is looking at”

We used big thumbnails in our study, but we didn’t test small.

We kept it to just what the user saw, specifically the last view of the page the user saw before leaving it, however theoretically the top of the webpage is may be the most distinguishing and thus possibly more memorable, but then again you certainly can click a link to a new page with an anchor and never have seen the top.

“3. “The page said ____””

In our user study, we found this to be the most important memory aspect in terms of webpages. Slashdot looks the same today, yesterday, everyday, you would probably access it the same way too (type it, bookmark it), but the content is what is different. Not to mention if you can’t remember anything about what the page said or was about, why would you be looking for it?

We had summaries generated in addition to indexing the pages so you could filter your history in real-time by content, thus displaying only the groupings that pertain to what you are looking for. It was an important detail that the filtering only weeded out whole groups but not individual pages. All nodes in those groupings that had relevant nodes would find their irrelevant nodes subtly smaller and de-saturated, that way you can both search to find your target page and single it out, while still having the ability to search for how you got there with your target page still visible.

“4. Today, yesterday, a long time ago…”

While you probably aren’t going to zero in on a page by dates beyond yesterday, but keeping it chronological though does help with associating what you see to what you did. Chronology may help you pick the right page in the list if you have the ability to distinguish between when you visited a site 1 week ago and 3 weeks ago and you can remember that you want the second visit.

]]> By: CT http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-261 CT Tue, 23 Jan 2007 17:41:35 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-261 Here's a cool article from 1995: http://www.w3.org/Conferences/WWW4/Papers2/270/ Using Graphic History in Browsing the World Wide Web Mate Firefox Showcase with https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1756/ and you're almost there. :) Here’s a cool article from 1995: http://www.w3.org/Conferences/WWW4/Papers2/270/ Using Graphic History in Browsing the World Wide Web

Mate Firefox Showcase with
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1756/
and you’re almost there. :)

]]> By: G David Frye http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-260 G David Frye Tue, 23 Jan 2007 17:14:36 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-260 I spotted this article while searching for "firefox browser history", as I'm trying to get specifics on the new format for history in 2.0. The interesting thing is that I came to the same conclusion you did about displaying results. I have a daily script that dumps the (mork) history file for each of my kids, and sends me an HTML-formatted email of where they've been on the web that day. It makes a LOT of sense to be able to display history entries on a per-site basis, especially when you want the big picture of how the browser has been used. And I think many of us mentally organize what we've done on a per-site basis and looking for links will be easier the way you have proposed. But the need for a more chronological system is still there. People who routinely use the "google THIS, click THAT" style of searching often don't know what site they were visiting when they looked at something 25 searches ago. So I would recommend that history be viewable in strict chronological order, or by site, or a hybrid along the lines of "sites from today, yesterday, earlier". I spotted this article while searching for “firefox browser history”, as I’m trying to get specifics on the new format for history in 2.0.

The interesting thing is that I came to the same conclusion you did about displaying results. I have a daily script that dumps the (mork) history file for each of my kids, and sends me an HTML-formatted email of where they’ve been on the web that day.

It makes a LOT of sense to be able to display history entries on a per-site basis, especially when you want the big picture of how the browser has been used. And I think many of us mentally organize what we’ve done on a per-site basis and looking for links will be easier the way you have proposed.

But the need for a more chronological system is still there. People who routinely use the “google THIS, click THAT” style of searching often don’t know what site they were visiting when they looked at something 25 searches ago. So I would recommend that history be viewable in strict chronological order, or by site, or a hybrid along the lines of “sites from today, yesterday, earlier”.

]]> By: Basil Hashem http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-212 Basil Hashem Thu, 18 Jan 2007 01:37:25 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-212 The folks at AttentionTrust have created the ATX extension which is an augmented history recorder. See http://www.attentiontrust.org/users/atx. What I think is more interesting is the with the data collected you can learn a lot about your own browsing habits via statistics and visualizations. The folks at AttentionTrust have created the ATX extension which is an augmented history recorder. See
http://www.attentiontrust.org/users/atx. What I think is more interesting is the with the data collected you can learn a lot about your own browsing habits via statistics and visualizations.

]]> By: fwenzel http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-209 fwenzel Wed, 17 Jan 2007 06:51:05 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-209 Well done, Alex. I like your ideas. Certainly as you pointed out, the history would need fuzziness for the point in time the page was visited. The periods would probably also need to increase, the longer ago a page was visited. While I am probably able to say tell that it was last week, I am more likely to be unable to tell if I saw something two or rather three weeks ago. Well done, Alex. I like your ideas. Certainly as you pointed out, the history would need fuzziness for the point in time the page was visited. The periods would probably also need to increase, the longer ago a page was visited. While I am probably able to say tell that it was last week, I am more likely to be unable to tell if I saw something two or rather three weeks ago.

]]> By: Makinde Adeagbo http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-202 Makinde Adeagbo Tue, 16 Jan 2007 08:33:10 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-202 Hey Alex, You make some good points here. I've actually been working on a prototype of similar improvements for a class of mine. See it here: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/4055/ I'll likely be continuing this work this coming term and for a master's thesis. I'd love to incorporate your thoughts and suggestions into the extension. Hopefully something great will come of my work. Shoot me an email if you are interested. makinde - (at) - mit Dot eDu Hey Alex,
You make some good points here. I’ve actually been working on a prototype of similar improvements for a class of mine. See it here: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/4055/

I’ll likely be continuing this work this coming term and for a master’s thesis. I’d love to incorporate your thoughts and suggestions into the extension. Hopefully something great will come of my work.

Shoot me an email if you are interested. makinde - (at) - mit Dot eDu

]]> By: Mitch http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-199 Mitch Tue, 16 Jan 2007 00:47:21 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-199 Nice im always gettin things off reddit and i can never find them again. Nice im always gettin things off reddit and i can never find them again.

]]> By: James Birchall http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-198 James Birchall Mon, 15 Jan 2007 22:42:51 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/2007/01/13/basing-the-design-of-history-on-the-users-memory/#comment-198 I always wondered why the history was implemented as a sidebar. Why not let it take up an entire window or a new tab? I always wondered why the history was implemented as a sidebar.

Why not let it take up an entire window or a new tab?

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