~~Mozzila~~ Mozilla is removing the compact density option because it's ["hard to discover" and they ASSUME "it gets low engagement"](https://www.pcmag.com/news/firefox-redesign-will-see-compact-density-option-disappear).
The new design uses much vertical space and and thus decreases available space for the actual webpage. And personally, I find the design ugly.
If they think that compact mode is hard to discover, then they should probably make it easier to discover. Or maybe just leave it as is, instead of ASSUMING that no ~~on~~ one uses it.
I don't see any benefit on removing existing code.
Nah that’d already be a reason. At only 4% or so global use, the same higher ups who make decisions to drop useful features instead of weird niche ones (I don’t want to deny some people can use an >200px UI area, but it’s certainly not a good default) just based off of “No one uses it. We think. Maybe.” would really logically have to conclude that since “no one” uses Firefox, they ought to drop it.
It’s such a shame, because the things Firefox does well, it does **really** well. You can’t force people at large to opt for a more privacy-conscious browser, but you can provide a browser meaningfully optimized for that use case for those who *do* care. But that browser still has to, first and foremost, be a usable browser.
They’re gonna save a lot of money that way.
>I don’t see any benefit on removing existing code.
I don’t think they removing existing code, they just don’t re-add the code when they re-write it the visual design.
Code requires ongoing maintenance and testing for various reasons. Removing less used features when your resources are finite can make sense. I’m not saying this is necessarily the case here, just wanted to point out that keeping existing code/features is not zero cost.
While dropping compact density is iffy, often decisions like this are based on telemetry results.
Though in case of arguments about compact density I find it really hard to follow. They acknowledge that around 1/3rd of users are still stuck on pitifully low resolution screens and decided to optimize for 768 minimum vertical pixels. Personally I feel like on 1080p current non-compact UI is *already* excessive and Proton redesign makes it larger.
My main screen is 1440p and that’s maybe the smallest resolution where I find current standard mode to be okay-ish, even if still a bit wasteful.
This was the first change I made when I started a new, long-lived profile. It doesn’t relate to resolution. It saves valuable verticle space. No matter how large or high resolution my monitor is, I can only see a fixed range without moving ny head. The other wasty theme should be removed if necessary.
*Mozilla
I don’t think they’re removing it anymore. They’ve kept adjusting Compact during Proton development so far.
Just switched to compact density. More vertical space is welcomed.
It is true that it is hard to discover.. I had to figure out where it might be hidden.
I’ve hated how bubbly and big Quantum has been, I kept looking in the wrong place for that setting, now that I know it exists I’m happy.. (I kept looking in view, or searching settings).
I just started using compact because of this post. I seriously had no idea it was an option.
Wait, they’re doing what? Why? Switching to the compact UI has been the first thing I do on every new Firefox install for as far back as I can remember, just like the small Windows 7/8/10 taskbar. I don’t have a particularly large desktop monitor and I don’t use touch on desktop so I’d rather like to avoid huge UI elements wasting space.
Do you disable telemetry when you install or configure Firefox? You can find your current settings under Options > Privacy > Firefox Data Collection and Use. What options are selected there?
What would it take to maintain a community fork of Firefox, hypothetically speaking? Like the way MariaDB was forked from MySQL?
I’m a mid level Dev with little experience in OSS.
I use compact and I’m beyond pissed off.
UIs in general keep moving in the direction of requiring more space to show the same information and I’m tired of it
At this point, Mozilla’s decisions only make sense if you consider that maybe someone is trying to kill the browser while pretending there is still some “competition”…
Lazy Mozilla dev: Checks telemetry data… Nobody uses compact mode, let’s just remove it.
Two third of Firefox user base: Telemetry disabled.
They should work on introducing features or fixing stuff before removing feature they pretty much blind guess their “nobody use the feature”.
Fix the saved-telemetry-pings folder that grows to gigabytes of pings. The other day, I was wondering why my profile was over 3GB with the cache cleared… turns out, it was the saved-telemetry-pings folder alone.
This reminds me of a restaurant that is getting fewer customers, so they aren’t making as much money, so they lower the quality of their food, since they can’t afford that quality with the money coming in, which gets them fewer customers. It’s a downward spiral.
The customers who think, “oh wow, I haven’t been there in a while. It’s actually a great place! Let’s go, I have to show you how great it is!” So they take their friends or family there, and are very disappointed, and think “gosh.. it used to be so great.. it’s such a shame they changed like this. Now I don’t want to eat there anymore.”
———————–
^^*Edit: ^^Thanks ^^for ^^the ^^silver!*
The first thing I do is switch to compact mode and move my bookmarks alongside the address bar. If they kill the ability to do that then it’s a shame.
First you make a feature hard to find, then you remove it because people don’t use it. It’s genius.
Let me guess – you can enable compact mode with CSS?
totally agree new fenix for Android is missing lots of useful features
I only use firefox because of the features they provide for “no one”, including user css and compact density options.
By default, I actually HATE firefox. However, because I can easily tweak anything I dislike to make it better for me, Firefox automatically becomes the best browser, since it’s tailored to my likings.
Thing is, when this happens, not many users use each individual feature, which MIGHT make the numbers smaller, convincing devs no one uses it. However, if they remove all the unique customization features, then as mentioned Firefox will be a terrible browser for me.
I don’t blame the devs though, they probably are at the point where they need to do this or they will not be able to sleep. I just wanted to put my voice out about how customization for the “1%” matters to me.
Actually that reminded me to turn it on for my work installation. I knew of compact density for ages (probably when I first started to switch back to Firefox back in v60), but I never needed to use it because I have a hidpi screen at home and I just prefer the normal size. But until now I’ve been working from home with remote desktop a lot and I adjusted the resolution way down to save bandwidth. I realized I suffered for a whole year of oversized Firefox UI for no reason!
Does Mozilla not realize that their core audience is mostly more technically inclined users? Users who tend to opt out of telemetry? Stop basing decisions off of poorly collected data and actually talk with the users. Now instead of improving the browser, they’ve just pissed everyone off needlessly. If they had just asked, none of this would have happened.
The whole proton redesign bothers me. Of all the things that I would like to see improved with firefox, a new design is nowhere near the top of the list. I’d much rather see those resources put into something else, for example better PWA/SSB support.
Firefox devs: *blink twice* if management is trying to kill the browser!
I so disliked when the moved the tabs to the top that I got rid of them entirely and switched to vertical tabs. So much more space!
Wanted to say that I never knew this option existed until now and love it! So after they take it out will there be a mod or something to restore the function?
Strangely, they turned urlbar into megabar because people allegedly did not use it much. So many double standards
As someone who likes Firefox for its UI, Vivaldi keeps getting more attractive everyday. Bad decisions after bad decisions from Mozilla jesus.
I will keep with using Firefox till it eventually dies off, however I guess I should start looking at other non Chrome options. So far Vivaldi and LibreWolf look interesting enough.
Are you ahueli tam?
Firefox has \~4% market share. Compact mode \~10%. According to their logic the whole browser should have been dropped long time ago.
Ridiculous. I need to see content, not the freaking UI controls. Doesn’t matter how big my screen is – I want as much space as possible for content. Leave compact mode alone. Fire those designers and stop redesigning things.
Most people who still use Firefox are tech savvy people and they most likely disable telemetry.
The decision to remove compact mode makes no sense. It is a basic and useful feature.
What can I say they fired the wrong people.
I turned this on like 5mins ago because I didn’t even know it was a thing and I’ve been using Firefox exclusively for a very long time. Now I want it to stay…
Who the heck still using Firefox today if not the tech savvy one whose loves all the features and customization option?
As days go, there’s less and less reason to use Firefox, to the point of I would feel dumb for not using the faster chromium-based browser.
My first question, “How do they know what the majority of users are using?” I don’t know anyone who says yes to anonymous telemetry except those who wouldn’t know what compact dohicky thingy does.
Absolutely agree with the title
Several months ago i had stopped updating all my browsers because of these shitty UI decisions
I’ll better suffer from malware than accept such sabotage
Also, never heard of compact design
Now use it and love it
if it’s a feature that was front and forward when u first launch the browser and ask you how you would like the UI to be i bet lot of laptop user would pick compact UI everyday they drop some feature makes want to switch like that zoom on address bar with that ugly blue border i hate it with all my being.
I don’t even know this exists until I search around from hint people left here, this is so bad mozila, the heck you put that option so hidden, the customize UI just filled with so many white space that I miss this feature…..
I’m going to be pretty unhappy if this happens. I use display scaling so compact makes the firefox elements of reasonable size. Otherwise its just huge.
They did the same with the ctrl + shit/ctrl/shit+ctrl + enter shortcuts: [https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show\_bug.cgi?id=237027](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=237027)
They got really bad in the last couple of years.
For all these years i’ve used firefox and I never knew this epic option existed. Oh well I will use it til it’s nuked then…
Stupid people. Stupid company.