1548331 - User onboarding ends on dead end after signing in to sync

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Firefox for Android Graveyard :: First Run, enhancement, P2)

Description

[Andreas Bovens [:abovens]]

Attachment: Screenshot_20190501-114839.jpg

On the sync onboarding screen, a user is encouraged to sign in/up, and when doing so, the message "This Firefox is connected" is shown. However, from that point, it's unclear where to go next: the "NEXT" button at the bottom is missing as we're in a tab now, and the only way to get to the Top Sites is by opening a new tab (or by closing the current one).

Furthermore, the iOS and Android download buttons on this page don't make any sense at all and add to the confusion.

I'm not sure what is possible here, but we should investigate how we can make this experience a bit better.

Comment 1

[Chris Peterson [:cpeterson]]

Is this Sync dead end a regression from the new onboarding code?

I agree that linking to Fennec's Play Store listing is a little confusing. Maybe we can say something about "Sync works with Firefox for Android, iOS, and desktop. Get them in the iOS App Store or firefox.com."

Comment 2

[Andreas Bovens [:abovens]]

It's not a regression. It's been like this for a long time.

Comment 3

[Devin Reams]

This is obviously very much the existing desktop-oriented "success / confirmation" screen served from the accounts site.

From the Android side: Can we close this tab upon completion and just show the "newtab" / top sites tab?

Alternatively, from the FxA product side: Is there an existing or more appropriate "success" page available to display?

Comment 4

[Alex Davis [:adavis]]

This has been a big annoyance to me that I want to address soon due to everything happening on mobile. (Fenix, browser choice, etc)

With the work we're doing on trailhead (and follow up work shortly after), we're reviewing a lot of our flows, including this one.

Some dead-ends on mobile (similar to this one) won't exist anymore because we're moving to confirmation codes rather than links.

Others may invite users to explore the other services we have to offer. TBD.

All this to say, it'll be addressed within a larger context.

From the Android side: Can we close this tab upon completion and just show the "newtab" / top sites tab?

That is an option.

Alternatively, from the FxA product side: Is there an existing or more appropriate "success" page available to display?

That's what we're looking into.

Comment 5

[Andreas Bovens [:abovens]]

What is the timeline for addressing this?

Are there any short term fixes we can do? E.g. hide the Google Play and iOS buttons, show a button to go to the new tab page?

Comment 6

[Devin Reams]

From the Android side: Can we close this tab upon completion and just show the "newtab" / top sites tab?

That is an option.

We will explore this in the app and if the feasibility suggests this is a "small" effort, then will attempt it.

Otherwise, if requiring much work or introducing much risk, will wait for a better mobile web page/success message solution from FxA.

Comment 7

[Alex Davis [:adavis]]

What is the timeline for addressing this?
Are there any short term fixes we can do? E.g. hide the Google Play and iOS buttons, show a button to go to the new tab page?

At this time, my answer is mostly "post-trailhead". We've differed mobile flow updates to after June 4th but should start them shortly after, although it may be after all hands.

Comment 8

[Vlad Baicu]

After investigating the issue, based on the events we have at our disposal, we can redirect the user immediately after signing in to the about:home page. If we want to redirect only if the user comes from the onboarding flow then the implementation gets cumbersome.

In all cases, redirecting to about:home seems pretty bad UX-wise as you can see the connected page for a fraction of a second before the home screen is loaded.

In my opinion it would be best if we could implement this change in FxA.

Comment 9

[Devin Reams]

In my opinion it would be best if we could implement this change in FxA.

Agreed.

Discussed with Andreas today: we'd like to test having a hyperlink on a page that when clicked opens about:home so the user could see "you're all done" and then "click to start browsing" which would then allow them to effectively close this screen.

Comment 10

[Andreas Bovens [:abovens]]

Is there any way we can make this happen before July 9, Alex?

Comment 12

[Alex Davis [:adavis]]

I'm looking into this and making it part of the discussion with regards to deploying the trailhead design to mobile.

I've also been documenting all the various bugs filed about this poor user experience. This bug is the 4th one. 🤦🏼‍♂️

Here is the one still open on the FxA Github:
https://github.com/mozilla/fxa/issues/615

I've flagged it as part of trailhead and link back to this bug for more context.

We should be prioritizing post-June 4th work over the next week.

Comment 13

[Shane Tomlinson [:stomlinson]]

(In reply to Devin Reams (dreams) from comment #9)

In my opinion it would be best if we could implement this change in FxA.

Agreed.

Discussed with Andreas today: we'd like to test having a hyperlink on a page that when clicked opens about:home so the user could see "you're all done" and then "click to start browsing" which would then allow them to effectively close this screen.

I do not think we are able to open about:home from within FxA. about: URLs are privileged and FxA is just normal web content. We could send a WebChannel message to Fennec and have it open the page on our behalf, though that will require updates to Fennec.

Comment 14

[Shane Tomlinson [:stomlinson]]

Barring changes to Fennec, we can have Fennec open Sync Preferences [1]. It's not great, but perhaps better.

[1] - https://searchfox.org/mozilla-central/source/mobile/android/modules/FxAccountsWebChannel.jsm#353

Comment 15

[Vlad Baicu]

As discussed in the previous meeting, it would be best if we could have FxA send us a new web channel event in order to open about:home.

I can implement it on the Fennec side when it's available.

Comment 16

[Shane Tomlinson [:stomlinson]]

(In reply to Vlad Baicu from comment #15)

As discussed in the previous meeting, it would be best if we could have FxA send us a new web channel event in order to open about:home.

I can implement it on the Fennec side when it's available.

Vlad, dreams, what is the priority of this since Mozilla is putting so much effort into getting Fenix out the door?

Comment 17

[Devin Reams]

Vlad, dreams, what is the priority of this since Mozilla is putting so much effort into getting Fenix out the door?

Fairly high to help make for a better onboarding experience in light of various promotions happening right now.

But if the level of effort to send that event vs. modifying the landing page itself is much higher, then balancing one over the other seems wise (deferring to a product decision, either way).

Comment 18

[Alex Davis [:adavis]]

We are doing planning for mobile trail head this week. I am requesting that this final screen of the flow be changed as part of our effort for July 9th. Since we will be heads down on revising our mobile flow, this seems like the right time to make adjustments.

we can have Fennec open Sync Preferences [1]. It's not great, but perhaps better.

I would not recommend doing this. I've seen in user research that users have been really confused when this happens. It is just as much as dead-end as asking them to connect another mobile device.

Since we cannot send users to about:home , please send me your recommendations as per what content you believe we should display to users. I will work with UX to explore options.

Comment 19

[Alex Davis [:adavis]]

please send me your recommendations as per what content you believe we should display to users

Note that the ideas mentioned already:

• promoting our other services like Lockwise since it's within the spirit of Trailhead and it complements our mobile browser well
• showing how to send a tab if the user already has 2 devices (learning about a feature that's in the mobile browser thanks to the account they signed in to)

Some are easier than others so we'll have to keep that in consideration too. There may be a phase 1 and a phase 2 to meet the deadline.

Comment 20

[Andreas Bovens [:abovens]]

What's the status here?

Comment 21

[Chris Peterson [:cpeterson]]

No changes at this time. Fennec is a low priority and will require Keith Willowhawk to decide which Fennec issues warrant Softvision engineers' time.

1. IIUC, this is a web page controlled by the FxA team, not code in Fennec. So the page can be redesigned and deployed by the FxA team without needing to ship a Fennec update.

2. Vlad says (comment 8) that Fennec code could use the sign-in events to automatically redirect to about:home (but he warns that "redirecting to about:home seems pretty bad UX-wise as you can see the connected page for a fraction of a second before the home screen is loaded").

Comment 22

[Chris Peterson [:cpeterson]]

Dropping priority to P2 because we don't need to fix this in Fennec ESR 68.

Comment 23

[BMO Automation]

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