Testing new visual design III

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Thanks!

Mithrandir

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Not sure if someone else has mentioned this, or if it's a bug, but I can't move the highlighter with the arrow keys in the "Meanings of x" if there's some extra zero-click info above it: http://refresh.duckduckgo.com/?q=hi , http://refresh.duckduckgo.com/?q=time.

When there's no extra zero-click info, the highlighter only seems to move about three topics with the arrow keys, but not with the mouse, before skipping to the search results. Also, if I press enter while highlighting a topic I moved the mouse to, the topic expands, but when I try this with the arrow keys, nothing happens: http://refresh.duckduckgo.com/?q=apple

This also applies to the stable duckduckgo.com, so that's why I wonder if it's a bug.

I'm on Debian/Firefox 9.0.1

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I'm getting those two bugs too.

[Firefox on Ubuntu]

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

This is a known issue, and I've marked it down but tabling it wrt to the visual refresh. Thanks!

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I made a bunch of fixes here so it would be good to retry this.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Update: dynamic resizing should now be in there. I'm sure I introduced bugs here, so any testing on it would be greatly appreciated.

What this means is you should now not need to refresh to get re-centering or other changes based on viewport width/height.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Works great up to about 350px. Then the search button gets cut off.

[Firefox on Ubuntu]

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Am noticing on /html that the quick info box has scrollbar and it don't fit. Obviously, w/ javascript you can make it fit for whatever so I'm not sure if this is fixable or not considering it's /html

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

We added the scrollbar there because they can get rather long sometime, and it is a good compromise. Is there some issue that is making them non-functional?

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

No it does not make it non-functionable. I am wondering if we can get the buttons at the top-right on the quick info box like the js version has??? At the very least the category button :)

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Right, that's done with JS. The category button could be possible though. I'll add that to the general list. That info isn't on the non-JS versions right now.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I am using Firefox 8 and the page "bounces" while it's rendering the first time you load it.

You can see the un-styled search box at first in the upper left -- similar to if you were to View > Page Style > No Style -- then it looks normal except for the lower frame not loading and the normal search box being one or two rows higher. After it pulls in the assets for the lower frame the search box drops a few rows and all is well. Whole process is about three seconds, and it's a three step "bug".

Kind of difficult to explain but I can capture a portion of my X session and send the video to either yegg or _nil if it is not already known.

Might not be a "bug" per se. Could just be that I'm out in the middle of nowhere visiting family with a slow DSL line and it takes a minute to grab the assets and render the page.

--
pierce

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I think this is just not having the assets and the browser deciding to show something before it has them, but duly noted.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Update: added a bunch of fixes for mobile browsers. As many have pointed out, the rendering engines don't handle the search box components very well, and the interaction with them anyone (like the dropdown) is a bit confusing and cumbersome. So I hid them for now on mobile.

Also fixed dynamic resizing on homepage vertically and horizontally.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

On /html 'after search' the search results are shown but the search entry box is empty.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I'm using chromium on Ubuntu, and found that when resizing, the search term is pushed upward in the search box:

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I'm having a hard time reproducing this so far, though I'm not on Ubuntu yet.

So are you saying it starts out centered and only happens when the search box gets resized or it moves up immediately?

Also, the voice icon in there -- that's from an extension right? Could that be messing with it?

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Oops, yeah, a Google voice extension. Good catch. I disabled it now and now it works fine. I suppose the resizing confused it.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Update: all supporting HTML files (about, goodies, etc.) should now be re-factored. Let me know if you notice anything weird with them!

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

A few things I noticed in regards to the static pages that might need fixing:

On the about page, it says to "Click here to try searching now!" Maybe instead "Try searching now above!"?
The privacy policy footer seems a bit unnecessary for the static pages.
Could there by a way to subscribe to the feature testing or spread DuckDuckGo e-mail lists without going through the feedback form?
Maybe a link somewhere to the terms of service would be helpful?
It's possible for me to scroll down a bit on the about page even though the entire page fits on my screen.

Moderator

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Happy Birthday

1. Should now be fixed.

2. Why you say that? Do you think the footer shouldn't exist or just the privacy message or just the additional privacy policy link? Is there another message that works better on these pages?

3. There could be but not sure a simpler place to integrate it. If you don't submit feedback but check the buttons it still works (without bothering anyone). Suggestions welcome of coruse.

4. The TOS are largely irrelevant :). Nevertheless, you're probably right. Maybe an article at help.duckduckgo.com? What do you think?

5. That was due to a previous reported bug that on some browsers without that space the footer messes it up.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Is the error page supposed to work? I keep getting a 500 error.

[Firefox on Ubuntu]

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Thanks.
The footer makes sense on the homepage because its the only link to the privacy policy on that page. On the static pages, there's already a link to the privacy policy in the header, so the footer seems repetitive.
I just noticed that you can subscribe to the two minor newsletters from the spread page. Still, maybe having it on the about page next to the monthly newsletter would be helpful.
An article about it in the support center would be good. I'm normally used to seeing the terms of service paired with the privacy policy in the footer though.
Okay. Thanks for clarifying.

Moderator

goom

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

i noticed that if i go to 'settings' directly from another page (e.g. 'goodies') i'm taken back to that page after clicking 'back to search'; maybe it could be reworded to 'previous page'? 'home' instead of 'back to search', works fine when coming from an outside site, so is fine as is.
maybe 'back to search' on the settings page isn't even necessary now that you've changed it so the search bar is visible still.

lastly, when i press enter in the search bar with no query on the 'settings' or 'feedback' pages, i'm taken to http://refresh.duckduckgo.com/?q= (inconsistent with 'goodies', 'about', and 'privacy', where 'put search terms here' appears in the bar). i feel like it would be best for the result to be identical regardless of which page i'm viewing.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Nice catches! Both of these should now be fixed.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I was wondering. The special duck logos only display on DDG's home page. Would it be possible to have the special duck logos display in the search results instead of the regular duck?
I am not sure how it would work considering the duck is in a circle at the home page and not in the search results. I would like to see the special duck logos in the search results too because often I bypass the homepage when I type stuff in the search bar on my browser.
I was just wondering if it could be possible, or practical, in the new visual design.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

That image could be replaced in the same fashion but it would require the designer to make a version for it, which is a lot of work. Definitely possible though.

hathix

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Homepage looks great! But I'm not a big fan of the new 0-click box, it's a bit too round and gray. The box can be improved from the current one, I agree, but I'd suggest making it less gray (more colorful) and shrinking the huge header bar.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Thanks! The idea was to make the 0-click box any bigger, but through fixing a bunch of other bugs in these threads that goal somehow got away from me. I just re-factored those pieces and checked and now it should be about the same, and on average a tiny bit less. Also some other elements have been moved up so generally there should be a bit more on the page in this new design.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Update: added article and ellipsis icons in the zero-click box so now all articles should be aligned correctly on the left, e.g. http://refresh.duckduckgo.com/?q=sonos. Also fixed various padding issues in the zero-click box that was causing things to be different widths in certain situations.

bizarre

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Little problem with search box width when the browser window is short (vertically).

Excuse the messed up screenshot, firefox is translucent right now

In that screenshot, I used firebug to make the rendering area smaller, then reloaded the page. As you can see, the search box isn't quite long enough to match the width of everything else. If I close firebug, then reload the page, it goes back to the right width.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

This should now be fixed!

bizarre

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Yup, looks good!

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Just wondering - are you going to style the buttons?

[Firefox on Ubuntu]

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

What buttons?

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Like the buttons on the goodies page(right now the browser does the default styling)?

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Update: https://refresh.duckduckgo.com/search_box.html now uses the latest design (the actual box that is -- the page was updated earlier).

I'm closing in on all outstanding bugs on my end, so keep any you see coming -- really appreciate all the feedback -- it's awesome!

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The banner search box doesn't use the updated DuckDuckGo logo.

Moderator

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The text is grayed out when I type in the regular search box.

[Firefox on Ubuntu]

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I noticed on the settings page (https://refresh.duckduckgo.com/settings.html), where you can decide if you want 0-click info, it still describes the 0-click box as a red box. In the new version the 0-click info is not in a red box. I would recommend changing that to something else (gray box?), or make the new box red. I personally would like to see the new box have a red, or maybe a lighter red outline. That way it would stick with tradition, plus, articles on DDG usually mentions the red 0-click box.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Changed it to box. You can make it read again by doing &kab=r or changing it in the settings.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Some more bugs:

The terms of service uses "Duck Duck Go" instead of "DuckDuckGo".
The footer is in bold on the spread page. (The bold tag that was opened before the words "Level 7" was not closed.)

Moderator

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Fixed spread page.

On terms, I had kept that in on purpose. The official company name has spaces. And if I thought it would be easier not to change the agreement and provide notice of such a trivial change.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I have noticed that if you are on the results page and hover over the more button, there is a flag by settings.

But, if you go to a different page (like the about page) there is no flag.

It really isn't that big of deal; just trying to keep everything as unified as possible.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Yes indeed! That is happening right now in the backend. It could be moved to the front end but this interaction is likely changing so I left it alone. Writing it down though!

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The "sponsored links" are a little annoying. Having long used Google my eyes skipped right over them, but the whole idea of having an ad in the same area as the search results seems like a step in the wrong direction to me. Why don't we keep them separate and maintain a clean, spam-free zone.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The previous ads on the right were taking up more space than this new sponsored link and they weren't being seen much, resulting in essentially zero effectiveness. Additionally, we continually get requests for actually having sponsored links in-line because when relevant they often add something to the result set. So what we hope to do is kill three birds with one stone: a) add in a relevant sponsored link; b) generate real revenue; c) reclaim the space on the right side for more interesting interactions.

We've been testing this for a while on some traffic and it has preformed well with essentially zero complaint. We realize there will be some people who don't want it, which is why there is a setting to turn if off (ad block works too).

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The "sponsored links" are a little annoying.

Meh. I usually ignore most advertisements as well. Although, I have made a few impulse purchases -- mostly books -- because of the amazon affiliate links on the right. As long as the sponsored results stay compact and don't consume huge swaths of space as I have seen a number of times with Google, then I'm cool with it. The trained eye will always identify relevant or compelling ads and act accordingly. Same holds true for slightly more spammy ones.

Also as yegg has stated: In-line ads work plain and simple. They drive much higher click through rates. Thus, generating more revenue, allowing expansion and keeping the VC happy.

I still prefer the "old style" of ads because they are more visually compelling, in that, I actually see a visual representation of the product. Akin to dangling a carrot in front of me rather than having an arrow shaped sign that says "Carrots" pointing to some distant location that may or may not have the carrots I am looking for.

The new method is rather bland and generic compared to the previous method. Perhaps with further feedback and experimentation there will be a way to combine these features in both a compact and appealing way without becoming content bloated like Bing proper.
--
pierce

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I think it would be nice to have some sort of button in or by those advertisements to turn them off. Most people probably don't expect that DDG would actually let you disable adds (seriously what site does that?).

It would also give first time users a sense that DDG wants to make there results relevant to them.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The intention (after this redesign goes live) is to expand the more results/sponsored link text into a menu (that's why there is an arrow there). That menu will have various contextual links like report this ad/result is irrelevant/not useful.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I noticed that in the settings page on the option to turn ads off it still says "sponsor banners in the right column" when they aren't their anymore.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Thanks! Changed this to "Links labeled as sponsored."

ekydetik

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I can't see the rest of !bang dropdown in a small resolution.

The problem with the highlight bar on the 0-click info box still exist when we use navigation button (up, down, etc).

Etjaark

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The hightlight bar has also a problem with the twitter username search (like @duckduckgo ) .

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

The twitter one should now be fixed.

The drop down one is troublesome, but this drop down is likely to be revised soon (within the context of this refresh) so I'm going to table it for a bit.

Haven't looked into the other highlighting one yet.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

This highlighting bug should now be fixed.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

On the results page there is a spikey thing in the search bar near the clear query button. I'm on the IPad 1st generation's safari app. Would send a screenshot but don't know how.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

To send a screen shot you can click the home and power button at the same time. This saves it to photos and then you can email a photo.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Thanks! I never knew you could do that. Here it is:

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Hmmm... That didn't work, I guess I'll email it then.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

I have noticed that the more button and the bottom bar does not link to every page that the "original" buttons link to. Here is a list of missing links:

URL Params

Shortcuts

Technical

Add-ons

!Bang

Help Us!

Search Box

XMPP/Jabber

Forum

Chatroom

Logos

T-Shirts

Is there still a user friendly way for people to get to these websites. If so, I am obviously missing it. I realize why you probably don't want all of those links under the more button, but I think there still needs to be a way to access these sights. Right?

Some of them appear to have a link on one of the pages under the more button, but others I have not found.

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Yes, that was by design to simplify. Here's the idea behind the new organization for each of them.

URL Params - to be part of settings

These will all get wrapped into the new goodies page:

Shortcuts

Technical

!Bang

This is wrapped into support and via the contextual Add to X/Set hompage links on the homepage:

Add-ons

These are intended to get wrapped into the Community platform. There is currently a list of links down the right side. Of course, the community is open to different design there:

Help Us!

Search Box

XMPP/Jabber

Forum

Chatroom

Logos

T-Shirts

ekydetik

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

Scrollbar button appears in a minimized 0-click info.
Query : "tl;dr"

Re: Testing new visual design III

4 months ago

This should now be fixed!