Fenix: Allow users to manually re-order tabs

[vesta0]

User Story

As a user with a lot of open tabs, I want to be able to easily locate the last tab I was on and re-order tabs in a way that fits my needs, so I don't have to spend time looking for a specific tab.

Acceptance Criteria

• I can easily find and open the last tab I was on
• I can easily re-order tabs to where I want them to be

[ekager]

Relevant - adding lastUsed field to Tabs in AC: https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/android-components/issues/5178
We are going to be working on this very soon as part of Sync Tab work

[liuche]

Currently we put the most recent tabs on bottom, highlight the current tab, and will scroll to tab.

[yoasif]

Currently we put the most recent tabs on bottom, highlight the current tab, and will scroll to tab.

This matches desktop, but I use https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/always-right/ (browser.tabs.insertAfterCurrent:true) to get tabs adjacent to the position I am at when opening a new tab.

Fenix already opens tabs in an adjacent position when opening a new tab from an existing tab (spawning a tab). I think it would be nice to have the behavior of browser.tabs.insertAfterCurrent:true in Fenix by default.

It also makes more sense with gestures - imagine if a user swipes left on a tab and doesn't find the tab that they just came from (by opening a new tab).

Seems like that is also filed here: https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/10365

[liuche]

We've done this for MVP, but we'll need to talk about how to handle the different paradigms of: self-ordered tabs vs recent tabs

[tallus]

https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/3125 is also related. As a disabled user with working memory issues I rely a lot on visual/spatial memory to compensate. The current behaviour of opening links next to the parent breaks this as the place/ordering in no longer fixed and order and chronology are no longer related. For this reason I have always disabled the current behaviour in fennix when it has been present in other browsers.

Can the b:a11y tag be added (for cognitive disabilities).

[tomchiverton]

There's also no scroll bar on the column list of tabs, so as soon as full, new tabs invisible

[liuche]

@vesta0 will break this out into the actionable stages and then add them back into the sprint.

[liuche]

Just checking whether grid view is in November or October release - I see it in November in the release tracking sheet.

[liuche]

Also see #12243 with question around tabs opened by "open link in new tab"

[liuche]

We discussed what this would entail, and there's some significant AC work because the tabs tray is mostly in AC. We would also need to add a concept of tab order (which currently does not exist).

[liuche]

@csadilek we'll discuss this in backlog grooming on thursday, and we should talk about what the stages/complexity are for this issue so we could get a good size estimate. Is likely something that we'll want to pick up next sprint.

[Poopooracoocoo]

In the other issue we were discussing when drag handles could show. We liked the idea of them showing up in selection mode but selection mode isn't necessary in its current state as you can only add those tabs to a collection. You can still access the selection mode by going to save to collection in the menu.

Therefore, removing access to the selection mode by tapping and holding in favour of dragging and dropping sounds good, unless there's plans to add more functionality to the selection mode. (#15243)

I'll also reference mozilla-mobile/android-components#8376 as I did with the issue that this supersedes.

edit: now see #16132 and #16130

[madb1lly]

Hi all,
I'm missing this more than ever now I'm trying out grid view.

@Poopooracoocoo, the selection method could also be used for bulk bookmarking, bulk send-to-device, bulk share to other app, etc. and I presume that's why it exists, not only for save to collection.

Cheers 🙂

[Poopooracoocoo]

the selection method could also be used for bulk bookmarking, bulk send-to-device, bulk share to other app, etc. and I presume that's why it exists, not only for save to collection.

I hope so too! I really like bulk bookmarking 🤤

Google's struggled with this problem too with reordering bookmarks.

[liuche]

Hey @topotropic could you add mocks for this issue to the top comment? We will need the part for moving tabs around.

[ekager]

I filed a spike to hold time to discuss options for this feature (and will likely need an RFC for the AC changes) https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/15928

[AdrianJPx]

Hey liuche, the trail has gone cold on this issue the past couple of months, any news on when we're likely to see the ability to manually reorder tabs added back into the app? It's been great to get grid view back, but losing this 'skill' which the app had previously implemented so well has been so frustrating for those of us who like to keep a number of 'working tabs' open and move them around as we see fit. Any insights into how on earth this plus grid view got removed - this was such a backward step and we expect more from Mozilla. Every desktop browser for years now has allowed you to reorder you open tabs, I remember what such a feature first appeared. It's such a common part of the web browsing experience I just cannot understand how a company like Mozilla would casually discard it. Moan over, I'm sorry but it just beggars belief that they thought this was OK. Thanks!