729865 - UI for per-window private browsing on desktop

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox :: Private Browsing, defect)

Description

[Josh Matthews [:jdm]]

Thinking out loud, I expect we'll want:
* a new menu item (New Private Window)
* a new context menu item (Open Link in New Private Window)
* remove Start/Stop Private Browsing menu item
* disallow dragging tabs to windows of a different privacy nature

Things I would like, but need UX feedback:
* keyboard shortcut - I dearly love Ctr+Shift+N for Chrome's Incognito mode, but we currently use that to reopen closed windows. Could it be repurposed?
* visual indicator for private windows - I believe this was nixed in the past, but given that every other major browser has this, it's probably worth considering again

Comment 1

[Josh Matthews [:jdm]]

Attachment: WIP - Add UI for per-window private browsing.

Comment 2

[Justin Dolske [:Dolske]]

ISTR Steven already has some mockups of what UI changes should be applied in PB mode?

Comment 3

[Josh Matthews [:jdm]]

Comment on attachment 599916 [details] [diff] [review]
WIP - Add UI for per-window private browsing.

This is just a really simple proof-of-concept I've been using to test out my changes to other components (eg. history). The about:privatebrowsing changes help demonstrate that the window-level API functions - in a non-private window, you'll see the option to start private browsing, while in a private one you'll see a description of what private mode is doing for you.

Comment 4

[u428464]

This is the last mockup ( http://people.mozilla.com/~faaborg/files/20111101-cuttingRoomFloor/stealth-firefox4-full.png ) that I have found, but I think Stephen Horlander may have ones updated on the Australis design.

Comment 5

[Stephen Horlander [:shorlander]]

(In reply to Justin Dolske [:Dolske] from comment #2)
> ISTR Steven already has some mockups of what UI changes should be applied in
> PB mode?

Currently we change the Firefox button from orange to purple. But that is only on Windows Vista/7 or XP if the user enables it.

Things we have talked about in the past include completely skinning the browser with a dark theme: http://people.mozilla.com/~shorlander/private-browsing-mode/mockups/australis-pbm.png

Basically a look for "stealth mode". Which would be quite awesome, but would probably be a lot of work and there are always the concerns of whether or not you want to advertise you are in private browsing mode.

Considering impending UI changes I will put some thoughts into a consistent indicator we could use on all platforms.

Comment 6

[(no longer active)]

Has there been any updates on this?

Comment 7

[[github robot]]

Commit pushed to master at https://github.com/mozilla/addon-sdk

https://github.com/mozilla/addon-sdk/commit/dde5e5600780b592cb1e90711f38e9df6ad615bc
Update packages/api-utils/lib/private-browsing/utils.js

mention bug 729865 in comments

Comment 8

[(no longer active)]

Comment on attachment 599916 [details] [diff] [review]
WIP - Add UI for per-window private browsing.

My patches in bug 799001 do this and more.

Comment 9

[(no longer active)]

Attachment: Windows 7 Aero mock-up

(Received these mock-ups from shorlander)

Comment 10

[(no longer active)]

Attachment: Windows Australis mock-up

Comment 11

[(no longer active)]

Attachment: Mac Australis mock-up

Comment 12

[Josh Matthews [:jdm]]

This work is subsumed by lots of other bugs.

Comment 13

[Justin Dolske [:Dolske]]

Is it? My understanding is that we still wanted a new window styling before shipping per-window PB. Is that work happening in a different bug?

Comment 14

[Josh Matthews [:jdm]]

Yeah, that's bug 749394. I didn't notice that this one is acting as a tracking bug, so I'll mark that explicitly.

Comment 16

[Michael Kraft [:morac]]

Bug 823683 was marked a duplicate of this, but I'm not sure this is the correct bug, especially considering this is a meta bug for UI changes and bug 823683 was not about a UI problem.  

Bug 823683 comment 5 stated that changing the never remember history preference would require a restart, which would negate the problems I'm seeing.  Is that what this bug is for, if not bug 823683 should be attached somewhere else.

Comment 17

[(no longer active)]

(In reply to Michael Kraft [:morac] from comment #16)
> Bug 823683 was marked a duplicate of this, but I'm not sure this is the
> correct bug, especially considering this is a meta bug for UI changes and
> bug 823683 was not about a UI problem.  
> 
> Bug 823683 comment 5 stated that changing the never remember history
> preference would require a restart, which would negate the problems I'm
> seeing.  Is that what this bug is for, if not bug 823683 should be attached
> somewhere else.

I corrected my mistake there.

Comment 18

[(no longer active)]

(In reply to Josh Matthews [:jdm] from comment #14)
> Yeah, that's bug 749394. I didn't notice that this one is acting as a
> tracking bug, so I'll mark that explicitly.

FWIW this bug has outlived its usefulness, but I have no objection to keep it open until bug 749394 is fixed.