How to build a better web browser

Scott Berkun discusses building browsers:

Web browsers are funny things

Some friends and I were just discussing browsers and email clients last night (just Firefox/ThunderBird/Mozilla/Safari, really) so... I guess, I'm ready. Bring it on.

There is a reason that the page itself is the largest part of the UI of any web browser. Scroll bars get more usage than most other browser features combined.

Agree. I like Firefox, but the scrollbars are often too narrow. On the other hand, I've gone to great lengths to find "themes" that use up less screen real estate on buttons and toolbars, without being microscopic.

The rate at which people change the pile of sites they visit is slow. The accumulation of large numbers of bookmarks/favorites takes most people a long time. Many people have fairly small numbers of favorites, between 10 and 50 (this may have changed since research was performed).

Not sure on this. I'm probably an advanced user, but I accumulate an obnoxiously large number of bookmarks. Which, more often than not, I never revisit. I'm not sure if that makes his point or not.

What I mean is that every time I go to a url (regardless of how I get there) the system should add to a counter for that bookmark. This allows me to sort favorites by frequency of use.

I like this idea. I'd like to see Firefox or somebody incorporate something like this.

When I worked on the design of the explorer bars, the side bar thingies in IE4 & IE5, there was a big theory that I used (a theory well seeded by Steve Capps and Walter Smith) at work for why these things were worth building, and why they were better for some tasks than others. The idea was to capture the hub and spoke movement between websites that often occurred, where you'd be viewing a list of links that you needed to go through sequentially.

I've never found sidebars useful. I first saw them in an early Mozilla build, and I've always turned them off immediately. I don't know, I think it's a screen estate thing. They feel like they are encroaching on "my" space, without really adding a lot.

I do like the hub and spoke model, though. I definitely surf that way, but usually by opening new windows/tabs and "saving" one as a hub.

To support this kind of research, browsers should provide two things: basic project and annotation functionality. It should be possible to save the state of browser, tabs, pages and all, and return to it at will …

I'm not sure, but I don't think I'd use a feature like that, exactly. I don't believe I've ever found reason to make use of Opera's saved state feature, for example.

But sadly today, I know of many smart tech-head people who keep little text files on their desktops containing various passwords, credit card #s and other account information. Either they don't trust their browsers, or their browsers don't provide a convenient way to manage that information for them.

I'm one of them. I always turn off password- and form-data-rememberer tech, because I don't trust my browser — or, more precisely, I don't trust myself. I don't trust that I'll remember to wipe my computer's hard drive before I give it to charity, say, or that a colleague won't borrow my computer while I'm at lunch.

I don't see this changing. If the tech-savvy don't trust the computer, are regular folks? Should regular folks?

Lastly, the probable leader in the “things typed in most often” category are people's zip codes. There's no technical reason that a browser can't send a user's zipcode as part of the HTTP header, informing any website of where the user currently is.

Eh. I'd like to see the location-sensitive sites that I use often remember me better in general (why can't Switchboard remember my address for "Search for businesses near..." the way MapQuest can remember previous searches?) but I don't think I want my browser "telling" on me this way. Besides, I bet more than 50% of my zip-code-entry is not my own (shipping a purchase to a friend, looking up weather for where I'm going tomorrow, etc).

Red herrings

Scott thinks security and stability is a red herring for browser development.

Something is wrong if competition in any product line continually focuses on security and stability. These design attributes are basic requirements, not advanced features. You won't see advertisements for toaster ovens that say "Now, it explodes less often!" So while viruses, hacks, and crashes are still a popular topic of discussion for software products, better browsers involve getting past these basic requirements … I doubt it will happen any time soon, but I'd like to think browsers can reach the same safety/reliability standards of automobiles: advances in car safety/security/reliability do happen, but the baseline standard is high.

Scott's essay is ostensibly about Firefox and other "upstart" browsers — who else is listening to this? — but I think he's missing the point here. Firefox's developers talk about security and stability because IE, their main "opponent" if you will, is full of holes.

This is important to Firefox and other browsers competing with IE for two reasons:

• Security flaws are a major concern to end-users, particularly for deployment-decision-making IT managers — competing browser makers can use security concerns to "lure" away browser-users.
• IE has lots and lots and lots of pretty significant security holes.

If it weren't for IE and it's flaws, Scott would be right: Security and stability probably wouldn't matter. It's because of IE's acute difficulties and wide-spread adoption that bring security to the front of the matter, nothing more, nothing less.

I agree with him on the other red herrings, actually. I don't want a 3D browser, thank you.

What I'd like to see in a real, Next-Generation browser:

• Smart bookmarks/history:

  • Share-/Publish-able (so I can sync favorites between my desktop and laptop, or work and home
  • Integrated bookmarks and history - Bookmarks are almost always places I've been, they should just be a flag in the history, not necessarily a separate element
  • Better search/filter capability - Search helps, but I still hate having to sift through my history. Maybe I'm a "heavy user", but I see hundreds of pages a day, sometimes.
  • Manage the data: Keep some meta-data around, store the page cache (for comparison), check for updates, maybe offline viewable, scheduled updates?

• "Real" back/forward system - If I go two steps backward into my history, then click on a new link, don't erase/override the previous history, start a parallel track. I shouldn't risk "losing" my history by traveling back into it.

(I found Scott's essay from Slashdot)

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