1947144 - Evaluate supporting old ALT+DOWN/UP shortcuts to switch search engines

Status: UNCONFIRMED

(Firefox :: Address Bar, enhancement, P3)

Description

[Ryan McCue]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.15; rv:136.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/136.0

Steps to reproduce:

1. Enter a search query into the address bar
2. Hit Alt-Down to switch search engine

Actual results:

Search engine choice remains the same.

Expected results:

Search engine choice should have changed to the next option.

This appears to be a regression with the new address bar search engine system; as documented at https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/search-firefox-address-bar#w_use-a-different-search this should switch engine and did prior to the rework in beta.

Comment 1

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

The Bugbug bot thinks this bug should belong to the 'Firefox::Address Bar' component, and is moving the bug to that component. Please correct in case you think the bot is wrong.

Comment 2

[Marco Bonardo [:mak]]

Shift Tab should work?

Comment 3

[Alice0775 White]

New behavior :  Type search text, Shit+Tab then Shit+↓ Shit+↓ Shit+↓ Shit+↓
             or Type search text, Shit+Tab then ↓  ↓  ↓  ↓
Old behavior  : Type search text,  Alt+↓ Alt+↓ Alt+↓ Alt+↓
             or Type search text,  Alt+↓ ↓ ↓ ↓

I think, in the new behavior, the physical location of the keys are far apart, which is not a good UX.

Comment 4

[Ryan McCue]

Shift-Tab will switch focus to the search dropdown, but doesn't instantly switch the engine; you then need to browse through each item. Alt-Down is an instant switch between them - which is pretty key for a workflow as common as opening a new search.

For example, I have DDG as #1 and Google as #2.

• Previously, using Google was: type term, Alt-Down, Enter
• Now, it's type term, Shift Tab, Down (to open the menu), Down (to highlight the next item), Enter (to select the item), Enter (to run the search)

Aside from that, it's also really easy to keep the number of Alt-Down presses in muscle memory for each engine you have; it's way more difficult to do that with focus switching around.

Comment 5

[Ryan McCue]

Just noting this is also documented at https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/keyboard-shortcuts-perform-firefox-tasks-quickly#:~:text=Switch%20Search%20Engine

Comment 6

[Marco Bonardo [:mak]]

In the old system you still had to press Enter twice to search, or shift Enter once, from that point of view it's the same, you can still shift+Enter on new menuitems to search immediately, or press enter twice.
The order of engines can be customized and doesn't change, thus it can still be memorized.
We understand there may be some adapting time necessary when UI changes, but we also think the new system is easier to grasp and less annoying to users (we got quite some feedback about the engine icons at the bottom). It's also more accessible based on our studies.

I'll report your feedback to our designers.

Comment 7

[Marco Bonardo [:mak]]

(In reply to Ryan McCue from comment #5)

Just noting this is also documented at https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/keyboard-shortcuts-perform-firefox-tasks-quickly#:~:text=Switch%20Search%20Engine

Thank you, it sounds like the docs must be updated.

Comment 8

[Ryan McCue]

Just noting that I love the visual design and treatment, it's just the shortcut that's the issue here. If Alt-Down switched immediately between engines, it would be perfect.

Using keyboard navigation to browse the UI isn't a substitute for a shortcut. Same thing as, say, tabbing to the new tab button vs just hitting Cmd-T - for something that's used this frequently, it's essential to have a keyboard shortcut for.

Comment 9

[Ryan McCue]

In the old system you still had to press Enter twice to search, or shift Enter once, from that point of view it's the same, you can still shift+Enter on new menuitems to search immediately, or press enter twice.

Hmm - I definitely don't recall having to hit Enter twice, but confirmed this is the behaviour in a fresh copy of 135. Not sure if there's a pref that makes it instant instead, or if my muscle memory had just made me forget about it.

I do stand by the keyboard navigation through the UI here being conceptually more difficult, and breaking an existing keyboard shortcut I think is not great, but if you want to switch to an enhancement instead of a regression bug I'd understand on that basis.

If you do want to reformulate as an enhancement, my suggestion would be: allow Alt-Down to instantly switch to the next search engine (and Alt-Up for the reverse) without opening the menu or requiring confirmation. This would make it even better than the 135- behaviour for power users.