1704131 - Hard to differentiate between active (foreground) and inactive (background) windows

Status: REOPENED

(Firefox :: Theme, defect, P3)

Description

[Asif Youssuff]

Attachment: signal-2021-04-09-114706_001.png

Steps to reproduce:

1. Open a window and a page in it
2. Open a second window and a page in it
3. arrange the windows next to each other
   (optional) 4. Switch to another app, then back to Firefox

What happens:

It is very hard to tell what window is active.

Expected result:

Different styling for active and inactive windows, like prior to bug 1694526.

Edge and Safari continue to do well here.

19:01.32 INFO: Narrowed inbound regression window from [43a39c49, 45f80847] (3 builds) to [fade9b09, 45f80847] (2 builds) (~1 steps left)
19:01.32 INFO: No more inbound revisions, bisection finished.
19:01.32 INFO: Last good revision: fade9b09b56a7bf1d8d5c376aab9e1e70ef563ea
19:01.32 INFO: First bad revision: 45f8084703dfb67d33d3a40d3b81d0822dca4ef6
19:01.32 INFO: Pushlog:
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/pushloghtml?fromchange=fade9b09b56a7bf1d8d5c376aab9e1e70ef563ea&tochange=45f8084703dfb67d33d3a40d3b81d0822dca4ef6

Comment 1

[Asif Youssuff]

Attachment: edge.png

Comment 2

[Asif Youssuff]

Attachment: safari.png

Comment 3

[Blake Winton (:bwinton) (:☕️)]

(Putting this under tabs-bar, cause that seems to be the most related component. Feel free to move somewhere else.)

Comment 6

[BugBot [:suhaib / :marco/ :calixte]]

Set release status flags based on info from the regressing bug 1694526

Comment 7

[Geobert Quach]

See Also: -> https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1703789

Comment 8

[Ryan VanderMeulen [:RyanVM]]

I don't have a Mac to test on - is this only an issue with the Proton prefs set? In other words, does Beta88 have the problem too or is the pref being disabled there enough to avoid it?

Comment 10

[Timothy Nikkel (:tnikkel)]

Why is this a dupe of bug 1704347? That bug is about distinguishing the active tab. This bug is about distinguishing the active window.

Comment 11

[Albert Scheiner [:alberts]]

Attachment: ff88.png

is this only an issue with the Proton prefs set? In other words, does Beta88 have the problem too or is the pref being disabled there enough to avoid it?

It looks quite similar to me on Dev Tools 88

Comment 12

[Albert Scheiner [:alberts]]

Attachment: FF89.png

Here my currently Nightly to compare

Comment 13

[Asif Youssuff]

Attachment: beta-88

Not sure what Albert is showing, but the active and inactive windows look very different to me using the Light theme in macOS Catalina.

The difference between the two looks much more obvious to me than the current Nightly.

Comment 14

[Ryan VanderMeulen [:RyanVM]]

Thanks, sounds like the main new issue here is Proton-only.

Comment 15

[Julien Chaupitre]

FYI, Shilpa, since you were the one who indicated in JIRA that this was a dup.

Comment 17

[Pascal Chevrel:pascalc (PTO until April 26)]

Bug also reported for Windows 10

Comment 18

[Albert Scheiner [:alberts]]

Not sure what Albert is showing, but the active and inactive windows look very different to me using the Light theme in macOS Catalina.

Just to clarify, comment 11 shows Firefox 88 (Dev Tools) using the light theme on macOS Big Sur (11.2.3) and comment 12 shows Firefox 89 (Nightly) with proton enabled + using the light theme on macOS Big Sur (11.2.3).

Comment 21

[dreamer8]

I have the same problem in version 89, default - system theme (using dark mode in Windows) and dark theme, Windows 10 20H2 64-bit.

It was OK with default and dark theme in version 88.

I'm using Firefox in window mode most of the time, I switch to other windows often and when I start to scroll with mouse wheel, other action in other program is performed instead of scrolling page, like seek, volume change...

This issue is quite annoying.

Comment 22

[olivier sannier]

Yes, I couldn't agree more, this should not be left as is, you are leaving aside a good 30% of the general population just for the sake of "design".
If I, like many others, use custom accent colors, it's because we NEED them and we expect them to be followed by the applications we are using.

Comment 24

[Mykola]

This is direct violation of Windows design guidelines:

Do make it obvious when your window is active or inactive. At a minimum, change the color of the text, icons, and buttons in your title bar.

Source: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/uwp/design/shell/title-bar

Comment 25

[thorstenmz]

Attachment: Inactive vs active window of Firefox 90.0 on Windows 10

The bug remains in Firefox 90.0 (with Proton enabled) on Windows 10. I'm adding a screenshot to show how hard it is to differentiate between the active and inactive windows.

Comment 26

[user.2f]

Attachment: Firefox-Chrome-Edge accent color usage

Comment 27

[user.2f]

Bug https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1701266 is closed, but the question remains.
Why Microsoft Edge and Google Chrome use accent color and Firefox does not?
Have a look at the difference (see a pic above)
I guess an option "use accent color" should exist.
Also, please mention that both Edge and Chrome use different shades of Accent Color for distinction bw active and inactive window.

Comment 29

[Gauthzilla]

Yes this is really a MUST fix. I've seen many report of this bug (and even more complaints on internet), I can't understand why it has not been fixed yet. :-(
Btw, what is the reason for removing support of accent colors? And why is the disable proton setting not working anymore?

Comment 30

[Jay]

Please vote up the idea on the Mozilla Connect site, it probably needs a lot more votes for them to consider implementing this:
https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/default-theme-should-respect-system-accent-color/idi-p/214

Comment 31

[David Balažic]

By "vote up" you mean "give kudos" (the thumb up icon) ? Or is there a actual "vote" function (that I don't see)?

I already voted for this bug right here. (and 10 others also, currently)

Comment 32

[Jay]

Yes, I was referring to "👍 give kudos", sorry for the confusion.

Comment 33

[Sam Foster [:sfoster] (he/him)]

This is implemented as designed, so we'll need new direction from UX to address this. It is a regression for windows users and as the screenshots show there is a loss of information.

Comment 34

[Gauthzilla]

Regression as deisgned!?! Could these smart****s explain their reason of removing this usability feature? No one has ever been able to give a reason... Simply because there is no common sense reason!

Please fix it! If new direction from UX requires new UX designers, then change the UX designers!

Comment 36

[Gauthzilla]

A regression that affects many Windows users, why hasn't it been addresses after all these years? :-(
(and all the complaints here and in other forums!)
Isn't important to not loose users? I bet there are many switching to other browser which do not have this bug...
(beginning my self to regularly use others)

Comment 38

[David Balažic]

Is there any workaround? A setting? Plugin/addon? System app/tool (for Windows)?

Comment 39

[Masatoshi Kimura [:emk]]

(In reply to David Balažic from comment #38)

Is there any workaround? A setting? Plugin/addon? System app/tool (for Windows)?

Try to flip widget.windows.titlebar-accent.enabled in about:config and enable title bars accent color in Windows Settings.

Comment 40

[David Balažic]

Thanks, that is almost perfect!

Any reason why it is not the default?

Comment 41

[Masatoshi Kimura [:emk]]

I don't know. Please note that the pref will be renamed to browser.theme.windows.accent-color-in-tabs.enabled since Firefox 120.

Comment 42

[dreamer8]

(In reply to Masatoshi Kimura [:emk] from comment #41)

I don't know. Please note that the pref will be renamed to browser.theme.windows.accent-color-in-tabs.enabled since Firefox 120.

Thanks for this information, version 120 is already available.

With the new option in 120 it's better, but worse as with the old option in 119, possibly because I'm using dark grey color for active title bar, and dark mode, Windows 10 22H2 64-bit.

In 119 with old option it was like this:
https://i.postimg.cc/T1DrYzRm/firefox119-backgroundwitholdoption.png
https://i.postimg.cc/9X6dNQpB/firefox119-foreground.png

In 120 with new option it's like this:
https://i.postimg.cc/dQkRBy81/firefox120-backgroundwithnewoption.png
https://i.postimg.cc/zXTCmY2Y/firefox120-foreground.png

In standard Windows windows it's clear, dark grey for foreground, light grey for background, e.g. Notepad:

https://i.postimg.cc/9fgTPm0Z/notepad-background.png
https://i.postimg.cc/JhzZBDrR/notepad-foreground.png

I tried to add the links as images, by the markdown styling, but it was not working, with png and jpg format.

BTW Is there any similar option also for Thunderbird?