1007360 - Advertise Send Tab to Device from Remote Tabs panel

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Firefox for Android Graveyard :: General, defect)

Description

[Nick Alexander :nalexander [he/him]]

Further to Bug 958889 (which advertises Sync when the Remote Tabs panel would be empty), we should advertise Send Tab to Device in the Remote Tabs panel when it is contextually appropriate.

One case that could be useful is when:

* Sync is configured;
* Send Tab has not been used before;
* there exist remote devices other than the current one;
* and this is the first use of the Remote Tabs panel.

Or perhaps when

* we've seen a share intent that targeted Firefox;
* and we've never seen a use of Send Tab.

(That last is less well suited to the Remote Tabs panel.)

Comment 1

[Nick Alexander :nalexander [he/him]]

This is a bit of a stretch goal for Fennec 36, but it would really be nice to push folks towards the Share Overlay work that ckitching did.

I wonder if we could use the existing Snippet/Banner work, but only when the Remote Tabs home panel is present?  Or could we advertise (and allow the user to dismiss) at the top of the list of devices itself?

NI to margaret for her thoughts on using the Banner for advertising, and to antlam to spend a few minutes thinking about a small visual and copy for this.

Comment 2

[:Margaret Leibovic]

I think this could be a nice "contextual hint". We could do something similar to what we do for the sync promo banner, but instead of showing it when you don't have sync set up, we can show it if you *do* (and if you haven't used the feature).

Here's the code that handles the sync promo:
http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/mobile/android/components/Snippets.js#343

I have mixed feelings about us continuing to add more hard-coded banner messages in the product, but they're useful, and I think they will provide value as long as we don't bombard the user :)

Comment 3

[Nick Alexander :nalexander [he/him]]

(In reply to :Margaret Leibovic from comment #2)
> I think this could be a nice "contextual hint". We could do something
> similar to what we do for the sync promo banner, but instead of showing it
> when you don't have sync set up, we can show it if you *do* (and if you
> haven't used the feature).
> 
> Here's the code that handles the sync promo:
> http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/mobile/android/components/
> Snippets.js#343

Hmm, whatever I do will be Java-only.

> I have mixed feelings about us continuing to add more hard-coded banner
> messages in the product, but they're useful, and I think they will provide
> value as long as we don't bombard the user :)

How would you feel about a custom view, pinned above the actual list of tabs, that can be closed / swiped away?  I would naively expect the look and feel to be similar to the banner, since the interaction is so similar; but antlam may have other ideas.

Comment 4

[Anthony Lam (:antlam) Find me, @antlam on Slack!]

(In reply to :Margaret Leibovic from comment #2)
> I think this could be a nice "contextual hint". We could do something
> similar to what we do for the sync promo banner, but instead of showing it
> when you don't have sync set up, we can show it if you *do* (and if you
> haven't used the feature).

We could definitely try that. We might even try showing it if they've "shared a link" a couple times via certain methods (e.g. emailed it a couple times, or copied to clipboard a couple times).. Yes, it would be a guess but maybe there's something there (i.e. not many people I can think of will Tweet themselves a link).

(In reply to Nick Alexander :nalexander from comment #3)
> How would you feel about a custom view, pinned above the actual list of
> tabs, that can be closed / swiped away?  I would naively expect the look and
> feel to be similar to the banner, since the interaction is so similar; but
> antlam may have other ideas.

As Margaret already pointed out, I'm also not quite sure about adding a special case snippet. Though, since we do want to push towards greater task continuity, I can see how the "send to tab" feature should get more attention. But, I'm just not sure that this is the right way to tell the user about that.

Let's get some UR on this. CC'ing Gemma. Also filed bug 1088368 since this one is specifically about the Remote tabs panel.

Comment 5

[Gemma Petrie (she/her) [:gemma]]

See Bug 1088368 for my response/questions.

Comment 6

[Nick Alexander :nalexander [he/him]]

If we're going to move on this for 36, we need some design input now.  I'll attach a screenshot of what I expect a home banner solution would look like.

Technically, the home banner is quite complicated and has been a source of bugs (with the scrolling in and out and handling touches).  It's not clear we'd want to actually use that implementation; margaret is the expert in this area.  This screenshot is implemented as a "footer view" that doesn't scroll in and just sits at the bottom of the remote tabs list.

Comment 7

[Nick Alexander :nalexander [he/him]]

Attachment: Synced.Tabs.Send.Tab.Advertisement.Mock.png

Comment 8

[Nick Alexander :nalexander [he/him]]

Attachment: Synced.Tabs.Send.Tab.Advertisement.Mock.png

Not landscape this time.

Comment 9

[Anthony Lam (:antlam) Find me, @antlam on Slack!]

Comment on attachment 8517236 [details]
Synced.Tabs.Send.Tab.Advertisement.Mock.png

I'm still not seeing the direct connection between this panel and the "Send to" action that we want the user to trigger when they're browsing.

I guess this is where their tab ends up when they do share it but then the first hurdle is to find the "Send Tab to" label.

I think we should take a step back and look at the larger picture behind this story. Is there a reason we're pushing to land this in 36? or can we do some more thinking around this?

Comment 10

[Nick Alexander :nalexander [he/him]]

(In reply to Anthony Lam (:antlam) from comment #9)
> Comment on attachment 8517236 [details]
> Synced.Tabs.Send.Tab.Advertisement.Mock.png
> 
> I'm still not seeing the direct connection between this panel and the "Send
> to" action that we want the user to trigger when they're browsing.
> 
> I guess this is where their tab ends up when they do share it but then the
> first hurdle is to find the "Send Tab to" label.

Not many people use Send Tab; those who do, love it.  This is one place where we know that users are using tabs on other devices.  It seems like a good place to advertise this related, little known, high value function.  It's a contextual hint, and we Like Those, right?
 
> I think we should take a step back and look at the larger picture behind
> this story. Is there a reason we're pushing to land this in 36? or can we do
> some more thinking around this?

No, there's no strong push to land in 36.  It's a thing we've talked about for a while, so I made it block the remote tabs 36 bug.

Comment 11

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