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Google Chrome To Disallow Backspace As a 'Back' Button (independent.co.uk)

Posted by msmash on from the all-time-convenience-vs-accidental-damage dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Google Chrome is going to stop people from accidentally deleting everything they've been doing. A future version of the app will stop the backspace button from also functioning as a "back" button. The change has already been rolled out in some experimental versions of the app, and has upset some users. Developers have said that the feature is only being partly enabled for now, in case there is "sufficient outcry" and it needs to be rolled back. People regularly press the button thinking that they're deleting a word from a form, developers said, but then find that they weren't actually typing into that form and so accidentally go back, losing everything they've done.

11 of 348 comments (clear)

  1. Give the option by Ormy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Default behaviour should be backspace does NOT take you back a page. Leave a setting somewhere obvious to turn that particular function on again. Was that so hard?

    1. Re: Give the option by yuriklastalov · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Found the Google interface designer!

      "We don't put options in our apps because it would confuse your silly little heads. Now go out and play little one."

      It's the Applesque "We know whats best" design methodology. And it sucks.

    2. Re:Give the option by lgw · · Score: 4, Informative

      It was dumb to map backspace to back anyway. With Internet and browsers dominating existence, keyboards should be redesigned with common browser clickies built in and separate from editing keys.

      Objections? Consider your useless neck broken and your body left for the wolves.

      And thus the wheel of pain spins full circle. Mainframe terminals have always worked this way. The terminal is sent a non-web form, the user enters some data in fields with Tab and Return serving only and always to move the cursor around. Once you're done, there was a separate "Xmit" key to post the form.

      Form submission was always explicit, and entirely compatible with high-speed touch-typists.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  2. Long overdue by Vadim+Makarov · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It took this many years until one browser vendor has noticed this usability problem? I have lost uncountable forms to this stupid feature. It works especially best when you are in a hurry or tired.

    Make it an option (buried in the config) for those who want it, and turn it off by default.

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    17779 eligible voters in a district, 17779 'vote' as one. This is Russia.
  3. Re:Really? This was a design decision, not a bug? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Firefox will ask you whether you want to leave a page before going back if there's data entered on the page. Chrome should implement something similar.

  4. hmmm by devoid42 · · Score: 5, Funny

    I would have gotten first post but I hit the backspace

    --

    I am a figment of my own imagination.

  5. Re:Delete the fucking delete button. Apple would. by Ambassador+Kosh · · Score: 4, Informative

    This one actually seems like a good design decision.

    On pc the backspace and delete buttons both exist and they work exactly as they should. Darned if I care what apple does.

    On chrome I also see back, forward and refresh/stop just fine.

    However the problem with backspace going back is that if you are typing in a textarea and you hit backspace it deletes your text (which is what you want). However if you tab to another control that is not text editable and you hit backspace you have now gone back a page and lost what you where entering. It violates all kinds of UI principles.

    Backspace to go back is just a bad UI and fixing it should definitely be done. There is no dumbing down involved.

    --
    Computer modeling for biotech drug manufacturing is HARD! :)
  6. WTF by Spacelord · · Score: 5, Interesting

    No! I use that feature all the time. Together with vimium, it allows me to navigate while keeping my hands on the keyboard without having to reach for my mouse all the time.

    I know alt+left arrow works too, but a chorded keyboard shortcut is a lot less convenient, and I'd still have to move my hand to the arrow cluster instead of staying close to home row.

  7. This is a problem? by NEOGEOman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is sort of weird. As a long time Opera user I never had a problem accidentally leaving the page. My browser always remembered what I'd typed and going forward again to the form page would have all my content as I'd left it.

    IMO the problem isn't the backspace key, it's unfriendly browsers.

  8. Chrome Development by Tenebrousedge · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well, no, that's not why that's there. The reason 'flags' exists is because chrome doesn't branch. Any features that are in development go right in the main branch, so there's no costly merging. It has basically nothing to do with UI concerns; it's a result of the dev process.

    --
    Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
  9. Obligatory by Cristofori42 · · Score: 4, Funny

    https://xkcd.com/1172/

    --
    "Is that dad? Either that or Batman's really let himself go."