An appreciation of Safari 4 tabs
Wednesday, 25 February, 2009 — misc
Things I like about the new Safari 4 tabbed interface:
- Opening multiple tabs no longer presents you without a way to reorganize or tear-off tabs that are off the main list. If you see the ellipses all the way to the right, and select an option, you will see that tab at the window. You can then act on it.
- Space conservation. By giving up the unified appearance of the title bar, there’s more usable space to view. That gives helps me actually lose sight of Safari itself and get into actually reading. This is one of the great things about Mobile Safari on the iPhone. The interface become inconspicuous.
- I’m reminded of BeOS. That makes me a bit nostalgic.
- Breaking up the title bar for the tabs enhances the tab metaphor. It’s where I’d expect to see an actual tab, were there a physical manifestation of a Safari window. Chrome and Opera broke some interesting ground here, but I like what Apple did with it.
- I want other apps to use a similar scheme. Terminal, Colloquy. BBEdit, too. In particular, I’m looking at Terminal and wondering why the hell it isn’t more compact already.
Other notes:
- Right now, I’m noticing the stop button, largely by it’s absence, not actually running into a case of needing it.
- I’m not missing a progress bar nearly as much, because pages load so damn fast.
- Gruber alluded to Snap Back dying, but if you search Google from Safari’s search box then click through a link, Snap Back is available. I’m not a frequent user, but I’m glad to see it’s not completely gone.