Feedback on the new 1Password mini
Comments
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@brenty: No, moving the window can’t help my issue for a very simple reason: I don’t always browse in the same browser window or on the same display (or even in the same web browser! for some things I use Safari; for others, Chrome). Plus, for pretty clear reasons, it wouldn’t help for invocation from the system menu bar either; in fact, moving the window to fix the issue for one window or widget would, of necessity, make it worse for the others.
The old way (“window pops up where my mouse pointer is”) is both predictable and convenient (from a “how far you need to move the mouse to get the job done” perspective); the new way is predictable, but inconvenient to varying degrees. Keyboard navigators won’t care, but many mouse navigators probably will. Why not satisfy both by making “pop up near where the mouse pointer is” an option?
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I am curious though about why folks want it to be smaller. I've read a lot of comments that it's too big, but to play devils advocate, so what? Is it preventing you from doing something and negatively impacting your workflow? That's some feedback I haven't seen, and I'd be interested to know exactly how making it smaller would help you and others in actual usage, so we can consider those things as we continue to iterate. Otherwise, if we just "make it smaller", it may end up making the experience worse for people inadvertently. Let me know.
@brenty, let me try to explain my version of answer to your question.
When I use a web browser, I think I am doing a multi-tasking rather than single-tasking work.
Suppose I sign-in a bank’s site for instance. First I open its top page, and then I start 1Password mini and choose the bank’s name in the mini’s list.
But during this process, I am not paying 100% of my attention only to the 1Password mini window and the ID and Password columns on the top page. Considerable portion of my attention are also paid, unconsciously and simultaneously, to the remaining part of the bank’s top page. There may be some attractive campaigns offers for customers, or some urgent security warnings to the users of the site. My brain is reading those information unconsciously while singing in the site, and if something in those information grasps my instinct, I may suspend sign-in process, and click the link to such a campaign or warning. Or I may decide first to sign-in the bank, and then come back later to click the particular link attached me.
But if the window of 1Password mini is too large and hides a considerable part of the web page, such an unconscious simultaneous reading becomes impossible. So I may have to read the top page consciously and carefully before starting 1Password mini to get the same result.The improvement in our workflow is simply the ability to see more of the underlying website when using the mini.
What @OAW meant by the above is probably not very different from my answer, I guess.
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No, moving the window can’t help my issue for a very simple reason: I don’t always browse in the same browser window or on the same display (or even in the same web browser! for some things I use Safari; for others, Chrome). Plus, for pretty clear reasons, it wouldn’t help for invocation from the system menu bar either; in fact, moving the window to fix the issue for one window or widget would, of necessity, make it worse for the others.
@dmz: Ah, good point! Indeed, that's why I prefer using the keyboard myself: anywhere I put something on screen is inherently going to be better for some things and worse for others.
The old way (“window pops up where my mouse pointer is”) is both predictable and convenient (from a “how far you need to move the mouse to get the job done” perspective); the new way is predictable, but inconvenient to varying degrees. Keyboard navigators won’t care, but many mouse navigators probably will. Why not satisfy both by making “pop up near where the mouse pointer is” an option?
I will say that 1) I actually really like this functionality on Windows, but 2) the Mac apps that try to do this have been, in my experience, pretty buggy. It could also complicate things by making 1Password not consistently appear where users have positioned it intentionally, which itself would seem buggy. It's certainly something we can look into though. Thank you for taking the time to share this feedback with us! :)
ref: apple-1359
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Is it normal behaviour that on unlock of 1Password that it doesn't autofill a website?
Furthermore, upon unlock 1Password mini shows whatever I was on previously e.g. favourites, as opposed to the website I want to fill a password for.
Screenshot shows 1Password mini opening to favourites, instead of the unms login, and it doesn't auto fill the login either
e.g.
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I will say that 1) I actually really like this functionality on Windows, but 2) the Mac apps that try to do this have been, in my experience, pretty buggy. It could also complicate things by making 1Password not consistently appear where users have positioned it intentionally, which itself would seem buggy. It's certainly something we can look into though. Thank you for taking the time to share this feedback with us! :)
I am... confused by this statement. For what it's worth, I'm talking about macOS (as, I would hope, was obvious by my referring to the system menu bar and posting in this particular forum); I don't care in the slightest about the Windows version, and Windows human interface design and behavior are generally quite different from that on macOS anyway.
The behavior I mentioned wanting as an option is, essentially, the way 1Password has worked on macOS for the last several years (up through a couple of betas ago, in fact!), but with the new window; nothing buggy about it, at least in my experience, though it may be that you've engineered yourselves into a position where you can't make it work reliably with the new window. Given the high quality of your software generally, though, that would surprise me.
I know from experience that many people do not even consider using the keyboard for navigation, and never use keyboard shortcuts for anything except the basic, common functions (copy, paste, save, quit, open), if even those. I'd imagine that, like me, a lot of users have also gotten used to the existing behaviors of the 1Password browser plugins and menu bar widget - which happen to match the behaviors that users generally expect of buttons they click on in toolbars and menu bars that are meant to disclose additional options (namely, that you don't have to mouse halfway across the screen to access said additional options).
If the plan is to simply tell people who ask about the rationale for this behavior change that "well, really, it's better to use the keyboard for navigation, try it and you might like it", as has apparently already happened a few times in this thread, I suspect you may be surprised by the reaction you get when people update. I certainly don't look forward to explaining to my senior citizen parents that now the 1Password button in their browser causes a visually unrelated window to pop up nowhere near their mouse pointer, so they have to look in (and mouse to) the center of the screen to pick a password; it was hard enough getting them to use 1Password consistently in the first place.
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Is it normal behaviour that on unlock of 1Password that it doesn't autofill a website?
@defiant: It depends on the context. What did you do to bring 1Password up and unlock it?
Furthermore, upon unlock 1Password mini shows whatever I was on previously e.g. favourites, as opposed to the website I want to fill a password for.
We do want 1Password mini to remember a search for a time in case you want to return to it, like Spotlight does, but we'll continue to tweak it as needed.
Screenshot shows 1Password mini opening to favourites, instead of the unms login, and it doesn't auto fill the login either
Were you perhaps browser Favorites shortly before then? What is the sequence of events when that happens?
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Sequence of events were as follows (after wondering why it opened to favourites):
1. Invoke 1PW mini using⌘ + \click favourites
2. Lock 1PW
3. Browse to a website login page invoke 1PW using⌘ + \and unlock 1PWThat's where I end up, with this screenshot:
So it hasn't focused on the website I want to fill, but it also hasn't auto filled the website login. The former wouldn't be an issue if it had auto filled the login details.
The thing is I can't actually remember if 1PW 6 auto filled the login details when you first unlocked 1PW using
⌘ + \:)0 -
I am... confused by this statement. For what it's worth, I'm talking about macOS (as, I would hope, was obvious by my referring to the system menu bar and posting in this particular forum); I don't care in the slightest about the Windows version, and Windows human interface design and behavior are generally quite different from that on macOS anyway.
@dmz: I'm sorry if you don't care, but other people do, so let's let bygones be bygones. 1Password for Mac doesn't live in a vacuum, after all! My point was that 1Password for Windows does bring up 1Password mini at the mouse cursor (though we have had some bugs with that), and I'd personally be happy to see it in 1Password for Mac if possible. That's all. :)
The behavior I mentioned wanting as an option is, essentially, the way 1Password has worked on macOS for the last several years (up through a couple of betas ago, in fact!), but with the new window; nothing buggy about it, at least in my experience, though it may be that you've engineered yourselves into a position where you can't make it work reliably with the new window. Given the high quality of your software generally, though, that would surprise me.
You said, “window pops up where my mouse pointer is", but that is not how 1Password for Mac has ever worked. Maybe you mean that 1Password mini used to be tethered to the toolbar and menu bar buttons. That's very different. Either way, they're things we can consider.
I know from experience that many people do not even consider using the keyboard for navigation, and never use keyboard shortcuts for anything except the basic, common functions (copy, paste, save, quit, open), if even those. I'd imagine that, like me, a lot of users have also gotten used to the existing behaviors of the 1Password browser plugins and menu bar widget - which happen to match the behaviors that users generally expect of buttons they click on in toolbars and menu bars that are meant to disclose additional options (namely, that you don't have to mouse halfway across the screen to access said additional options).
Well, I think you're right to some extent, but that's a shame. If nothing else,
⌘ \is one of the best things about 1Password for Mac. There will definitely be opinions (and complaints) either way no matter what we do. Just as you want it to appear at the mouse cursor, some people appreciate the predictability of knowing 1Password will always appear in the same place on screen. We'll see if we can find a solid middle ground.If the plan is to simply tell people who ask about the rationale for this behavior change that "well, really, it's better to use the keyboard for navigation, try it and you might like it", as has apparently already happened a few times in this thread, I suspect you may be surprised by the reaction you get when people update.
That's unfortunate. If you don't like it, that's fine. I'd love to hear why! But I don't think there's anything wrong with suggesting trying something new or different. Otherwise many of us would have never used iPhones or Macs in the first place and grown to love them (myself included). And, in fact, 1Password would not exist!
I certainly don't look forward to explaining to my senior citizen parents that now the 1Password button in their browser causes a visually unrelated window to pop up nowhere near their mouse pointer, so they have to look in (and mouse to) the center of the screen to pick a password; it was hard enough getting them to use 1Password consistently in the first place.
That's a fair point. I guess I just don't understand how this is different from Spotlight. Please don't take this the wrong way, as I'm generally curious: do your parents have problems using that? I've never really noticed before, so I'm going to have investigate with my own family. I really appreciate your input on this. There are a lot of things — and people — to consider.
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@brenty , I am glad if my explanation answered to your question to some extent.
In addition to that, I also would like to comment on the mental aspect of the issue.Suppose we take a bus. The purpose of taking the bus is moving to the destination, and so seeing outside through the windows on the way could be considered irrelevant to attaining the main purpose. But if the bus company covers all the bus windows with rigid shades for that reason, passengers would feel very anxious and uncomfortable.
Likewise, users of 1Password mini feel simply uncomfortable when they cannot see the large portion of the web page underneath the mini window even if it perfectly attains its main purpose to help signing in. They, or I should say we, always want to know what page we are in, i.e., what information are on the page, and whether they are very different from what we saw last time, and so on. And when we lose such a sense of whereabouts, we begin to feel uncomfortable.
Users of 1Password is human beings, and so mental aspect of UI is as important as its functionality, I think.
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@defiant: Thank you! I'm able to reproduce that here. It seems like 1Password is remembering the selection of Favorites since you selected that, which is by design; but I do think there's a case to be made that locking should "reset" this. I'll bring this up with the team. :)
ref: apple-672
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Cool, and what about not auto filling on first unlock? Is that by design?
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@defiant: Good question. Yes and no. Yes, because 1Password is correctly remember its state. But, I'd say, also no because in this context (unlocking to fill), it should probably have a "clean slate" and prefer to just fill the login for the site. Definitely something we'll continue to discuss and tweak.
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@ojix2: Wow. That's really deep. I do think you're onto something there. This is fascinating, and I think it's a good metaphor. I've taken buses where I've very much wanted to shut out the outside world to work or rest or read. In some cases that wasn't possible. And some buses are setup specifically for that purpose (overnights, for example). Other times I've very much wanted to watch the scenery. So I guess it depends on 1) the person, 2) the bus, and 3) the context. Arguably the same is true for software, though I'm not sure of what the precise analogies will be in that case. I sort of hate the phrase "user experience", but I think it's apt here. There are a lot of factors we need to consider, even within the human realm alone. I thank you for raising some of them here. :)
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@dmz: I'm sorry if you don't care, but other people do, so let's let bygones be bygones. 1Password for Mac doesn't live in a vacuum, after app!
"after app!"? really? For the purposes of user interface, 1Password for Mac should behave like a Mac application, just like 1Password for iOS should behave like an iOS application and 1Password for Windows should behave like a Windows application (does it? I don't know, and I'll never use it, hence "I don't care"; that doesn't mean others don't or shouldn't care, it just means it has nothing to do with my UI complaint about the updated Mac app). In order to be good citizens on their respective platforms they must of necessity have different behaviors in certain areas.
You said, “window pops up where my mouse pointer is", but that is not how 1Password for Mac has ever worked. Maybe you mean that 1Password mini used to be tethered to the toolbar and menu bar buttons. That's very different.
You seem to be messing with me intentionally at this point (though I already got that from "after app!"). I mean, there's no other reasonable explanation for this deliberate misinterpretation of the extensive text I wrote about the old behavior. To put it more succinctly, if I click on a button, that is where my mouse pointer is. If I wanted language lawyering, I'd be discussing programming languages with the SIGPLAN crowd instead of posting here; the fact that I didn't use the word "tethered" doesn't make the plain English interpretation of the old behavior I was describing any less obvious (as evidenced by the fact that you clearly realized what I meant).
That's a fair point. I guess I just don't understand how this is different from Spotlight. Please don't take this the wrong way, as I'm generally curious: do your parents have problems using that?
I actually don't know what my parents think of Spotlight, or if they use it. If Spotlight popped up a window in the middle of the screen from a button pressed in a browser toolbar, though, I suspect a lot of people (including them, and me) would be surprised. In any event, the current behavior is different from Spotlight in one crucial respect.
Spotlight essentially violates Apple's own human interface guidelines about menu bar widgets that display information, and I already said previously that I don't like that behavior in Spotlight and don't use it. Apple can get away with this, of course, because they control the platform, and because Spotlight's search window is unique in the system, explicitly set apart from all the running applications. 1Password mini's functionality is explicitly not unique (and that's what makes it different from Spotlight); it's duplicative of the main 1Password window, which I can open any time I want (because it's an app) and leave in whatever location I want on the screen (because it's an app) - in fact, the main 1Password window is a much better analogue to Spotlight's search window than the 1Password mini window is.
Leaving aside the system menu bar behavior - which maybe should just bring up the main 1Password window in the first place, like the Spotlight widget brings up Spotlight's main window - the bottom line for me is this: when I click a toolbar button in a browser to fill a form in that browser, I am clearly operating in the context of that browser, and I expect the button to behave accordingly (i.e., by not displaying a window in a completely unrelated position on the screen and forcing me to either navigate there with the mouse or remove my hand from the mouse to use keyboard navigation). 1Password 7 violates that expectation. If it's just me, I'll obviously learn to adapt eventually (because I won't have a choice unless I want to switch password managers, or keyboards, or both); but based on my interactions with everybody else I know who uses 1Password, I seriously doubt it's just me.
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We do appreciate everyone's feedback in this regard, and we do plan to continue to iterate on and improve the new mini. This is an x.0 release. :)
Ben
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@dmz I don't have a dog in this hunt, but I'm confused by one thing you said:
If Spotlight popped up a window in the middle of the screen from a button pressed in a browser toolbar, though, I suspect a lot of people (including them, and me) would be surprised.
That's...exactly how Spotlight works on macOS Sierra, except from just a few pixels further north in the menu bar, not the browser toolbar. Does it work differently on High Sierra or whichever macOS version you are using?
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I think we're a bit in the weeds here. :)
Ben
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the bottom line for me is this: when I click a toolbar button in a browser to fill a form in that browser, I am clearly operating in the context of that browser, and I expect the button to behave accordingly (i.e., by not displaying a window in a completely unrelated position on the screen and forcing me to either navigate there with the mouse or remove my hand from the mouse to use keyboard navigation). 1Password 7 violates that expectation...I seriously doubt it's just me.
It's not just you! I feel the same as @dmz.
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Thanks. :)
Ben
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@enerji Yes, I was making an explicit distinction between the browser toolbar and the Spotlight widget in the system menu bar. The former might be near the top of the screen (a few pixels away, as you mention), but might also be nowhere near the system menu bar or - on wide screens - the Spotlight widget thereon.
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That's...exactly how Spotlight works on macOS Sierra, except from just a few pixels further north in the menu bar, not the browser toolbar.
@EnerJi, not to excuse Spotlight's design, but the difference is that (when using the mouse) we are invoking 1P mini from within the browser and from the browser toolbar. Spotlight operates system-wide.
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@ben said:
This is an x.0 release.
Indeed. But it’s not a 1.0 release, it’s a 7.0 release with a major UI change made late in the beta testing process (at least from the testers’ perspective; the changes were obviously baking long before that, given typical software development timelines).
Clearly the magnitude of the 1Password 7 changes is nowhere near the same (and I’ll say again that I like most of them!), but roll with me for a minute and imagine what the reaction of beta testers (and the public, upon release) would have been in a world where Apple had, in 2013: 1) not shown the new (non-skeuomorphic, Jony Ive-designed) appearance of iOS 7 at WWDC; 2) released betas of iOS 7 throughout summer that had all of the eventual functionality of iOS 7 but looked basically like iOS 6; and 3) a couple of weeks before the iPhone event in September, released a GM build that had the completely new iOS 7 UI and had significantly different interface behaviors from the previous beta in several respects. It would likely have been... a bit jarring. :)
In any event, thanks for being willing to listen, and I do hope that your iterations on the new mini help resolve my issue at some point.
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Oh wow, I just realised that version 7 for Mac has been released. So at least for this version we're stuck with this humongous mini? Ugh.
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Thanks, Lars. Like many have said, the mini is too big. That's the main issue for me. I don't mind the other things within the window that has changed. It's just too big. Could the design be more flexible so that it could be resized to something smaller?
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