Improvement of synced tabs UI/UX, by integrating with "Workspaces" and "Windows"
-
Hi Everyone!
I'm not sure if this is the best place for suggesting new features; please let me know if you would like me to post this somewhere else.
I use Vivaldi's sync feature and have it installed on my PC and my smartphone (and I had it on my laptop). While the user interface for it is okay, I think it can be improved if the feature gets integrated into the already existing functionality of Vivaldi.
Current state:
There is a cloud icon that is available on the top right corner. If you use the Vivaldi account, you will see your other devices under it.
The same list is visible on the "Windows" sidebar panel.
The issue is that even though I use groups on my smartphone, all of the tabs are shown on a single level.
Both PC and Android versions have tab groups; this UI significantly limits how users can interact with the tabs.
Limitations:
- You can't see the groups that are created on the smartphone.
- You can't reorder the tabs.
- You can't close the tabs.
- You can only open one or open all of them.
- When you open the tab, the same URL is just opened on your PC as a new tab, basically as a copy. Now you have the same page opened on 2 devices, and again, there is no way to close that tab on the other device.
On the other hand, we have the "Windows" panel in the sidebar and the tab panel itself on the PC version, and both are very powerful. Another great feature is the Workspace section, and it perfectly integrates with the Windows panel.
Each workspace can have groups and tabs. Each smartphone can have groups and tabs.
Future State:
I'm proposing to show tabs from synced devices as independent workspaces, like this:
When you click on the "synced workspace," all the tabs appear as other normal tabs, just in hibernate mode until you load any tab. (similar to how tabs behave now after a restart)
There could be a small icon or some indicator that this is a synced workspace.
Benefits (which can be implemented gradually):
- A behavior that's similar to other tabs and tab groups, from UI and UX perspective
- Synced workspaces from a different instance of Vivaldi on PC can be shown, again, as multiple workspaces
- Opening tabs from a synced device does not just open a copy of that page on your PC anymore. Cloud tabs can behave like hibernated tabs on PC, and once you click on them, they can load.
- Visibility of the hierarchy/groups (minimal information needs to be sent to the servers to support it, if it's not sent already)
- Ability to close the tabs and groups. [Scenario 1] - You close the tab from your smartphone or laptop - it is not visible in your browser. [Scenario 2] - You close it from your PC; it is removed from your smartphone. The second scenario is an ideal and seamless experience from my perspective.
- Ability to rearrange the tabs and groups
- Ability to do the opposite integration, with the visibility of tabs from PC on the smartphone as groups, but now seamless from the perspective of the smartphone UI (imagine the possibilities!)
The least resource-heavy part is the actual UI change and the addition of the groups; only some minimal additional data has to be synced. As for the other features, I suppose closing and rearranging items will trigger more API calls. I would, however, pay to have these features.
I have not seen any browser with such a level of seamless experience and integration, and if there is anyone who will do it, it will be the innovative team behind Vivaldi!
In the end, if tabs are fully integrated, there will be no difference from the user experience perspective between sets of tabs and groups on all of your devices. Each device will show the same set of groups and tabs, and updating one entry in one of the devices will update the view/list on all.
Hopefully I'm not the only one who likes this idea. Please share your thoughts and proposals.
-
@arammkr
Hi, please only one request per post.
I like tab rearrange but would never want have my 800 tabs from desktop on my mobile devices, horrible.
Cheers, mib
-
@mib2berlin Thank you for the feedback! Sorry, this top did turn into a multi-item proposal. I can open sub-items if that's possible. This proposal can be viewed as an Epic item that can be split into multiple parts, and it will most likely require several Spikes. Please let me know the preferred approach, I can submit an item only for "show tabs from synced devices as independent workspaces" part, or modify this item.
I have a few hundred tabs myself, and about 50 on the smartphone
Maybe the "Desktop to Smartphone" feature can be enabled or disabled by a toggle, although I doubt that the tabs on the smartphone would take a lot of memory, since they are hibernated by default.Although I mentioned Desktop > Smartphone in this topic, the proposal is mostly for how cloud tabs and groups appear on Desktop, and that they can appear as workspaces. I feel like this will be a good change towards a seamless experience across multiple devices. Hopefully people will like and approve it
-
@arammkr
Hi again, the problem is, Vivaldi on Android and iOS doesn't have workspaces.
There is a high voted feature request for this already.
I am sorry but the 800 tabs example was a fake, I tested bugs reported from users using up to 2000 tabs.
I would never use more than 20-30 tabs in real life.
Anyway, I would vote for requests with rearange and close tabs, if this is even possible in the sycn system.@arammkr said in Improvement of synced tabs UI/UX, by integrating with "Workspaces" and "Windows":
You can only open one or open all of them.
You can select one or whatever you want to open in the windows panel, it's a bit tricky to select.
Move the first tab a bit, then release the mouse.
Now you can select with Shift or Ctrl + Click tabs as you like.@arammkr said in Improvement of synced tabs UI/UX, by integrating with "Workspaces" and "Windows":
When you open the tab, the same URL is just opened on your PC as a new tab, basically as a copy. Now you have the same page opened on 2 devices, and again, there is no way to close that tab on the other device.
Synced tabs are in the sync system but they are not synced.
If you delete a tab on one device it is not deleted on other devices, they are independent not copys.
You can use the Send to Device feature, send a tab to a device, close it on e the source device.Please search for existing request on a user database page, we have 6000 feature requests already.
There is something for everyone.https://lonmcgregor.github.io/VivaldiFeatureRequests/#tag=&req=&minscore=0&tagsEnabled=
