Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
This new feature just caught me yelling at my computer last night! The active tab is dimmed… dumb.

I’m surprised at many of Apple’s design lapses. The app icons as a design system, for example, would get an F in design class. Messages icon is flat design and monochromatic, Photos is multicolored gradients, Camera is a pictograph, Safari is a very detailed compass thing, most icons are an object sitting within the rounded square shape, but notes just fills out the whole square shape. No consistency. The brain has process all that inconsistency which is not helpful when scanning a page of 20 apps. Bad Apple.
 
Last edited:
Why? Because you disagree with them? And you're right and they are wrong?

You're more than welcome to disagree with them, but there is a false view on the Internet that if you're "pro-something" that you're a shill, brainwashed or stupid. Some people just like things - that doesn't make them lobotomized. And especially considering how negative forums are - this one included - I always find it refreshing when people are positive about something instead of all the cynicism and negativity.

Again - be as critical as you want, but don't assume that people who aren't have an agenda or are being "sheep".

Personally, I find iJustine to be cheerful and fun. If you dislike her content, don't watch, it's as simple as that.
Nope, I'm happy to read and be exposed to opinions different than mine. I just find Rene, Gruber, and iJustine cloyingly annoying when it comes to Apple. There are many Apple fans who can deliver commentary without sounding like they're genuflecting at the altar of Steve Jobs. Is nuance really that hard to come by? This also applies to Tesla, Samsung, Sonos, and many others. It seems as if logical, balanced, discourse has been victimized in the name of hot-takes and brand idolatry.
.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Feyl
I am surprised how many people don't like the colored bar, that's my favorite new feature.
I am not, especially in a forum like this.

Everybody here is a little bit into tech (if not fully) and it is clear that macOS is having this iOSification-consumer approach, lack of solid software development and terrible recent updates like catalina and big sur. On the other side this year also brand new iPhone 13 and iOS suffered pretty consistent bugs. When I updated to 15.0.1 I lost a full day of work calls because couldn't receive or make calls anymore (Call Failed). I tried to reset network settings when I realised (too late) and now it seems ok.

But let's put apart the iOS and iPhone situation.
On macOS native apps like Mail, Calendars and even their own Apple TV app are all suffering big reliability problems that remain until now not resolved at all. This is without doubts reflecting on a "big" app like Safari. Apple is losing the ship, especially this year, and I really couldn't believe when I saw Safari with my eyes! Making me think that they don't even use it in Apple park!
From a consumer view, probably Safari is ok, I mean if I drag the tabs and the whole thing crashes, it's not a problem re-opening 3 tabs with Netflix, BBC news and Instagram.com. As well as shouldn't be a problem if the first is black, second turns red and third flashes white. Looking the things at a glance or for fun is never the same of working with schedules, deadlines, under pressure and with consistent workflow. After a full day of work constantly paying attention and guessing if the greyed out tab is active or not, even if only for that little micro-second in your head, do frustrate you and make you lose concentration. I'm not surprised at all for a mass switch to other browsers.

And again, there are those little things that "remain until now not resolved at all":
i) Apple underestimates web apps and browser capabilities
e.g. basically no web apps available for Apple services (that icloud.com beta thing... I don't even consider it)
and also Microsoft planned switching O365 towards web apps/electron in the future
ii) Apple wants you to download and use applications instead of the browser counterpart. Not even for a backup/on-the-go
iii) lack of web standards (let's not talk for a moment about ethic choices for a free web and chromium kingdom, it still doesn't work for some websites)
iv) group tabs in the end of 2021
v) lack of extensions
vi) ridiculous Safari Devtools and again concentrating attention only on app store applications
vii) once-a-year only updates for a web browser
viii) from an academic/university/students/e-learning perspective Safari is totally unreliable and again unusable.
ix) recently in pandemic situation and videoconferencing web applications safari has always been out of the game

x) good luck Apple!
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: dk001 and nvmls
Oh?

View attachment 1856995
View attachment 1856996

Random pick-a-tab-color game!

Also, the thing Gruber pointed out about "popping" was represented by the bottom-right of the tabs in that grid of awfulness: Though it's the selected tab, it has a lower contrast difference between the text and the tab color, making the text "pop" much less. For the text on the *active* tab to stand out less is an extremely bizarre decision.

Of course in the Private Mode equivalent tab in the upper-right, the opposite is true.

This design language is all over the place. Really beneath Apple's usual standards.
I'm not sure what you're trying to show. The active tab is the one with the greater contrast from the background. It could be darker or lighter but it's still the tab that's a different shade.
 
Can I just say that this new design is terrible. Where before I could recommend Safari as a fast & beautiful browser...now it is clearly an eyesore. I've used it since Beta 1. I thought I'd get used to it. I actually hate it. It's a major downgrade from Big Sur Safari. It doesn't match any other apps on the Mac. And with them not changing iOS Safari much, yet ruining both iPadOS and macOS Safari at the same time...I find it very annoying. To what end did they implement these changes? Sure, I can get an approximate of the older Safari design by changing a setting. But it's so much uglier. And they refuse to give easy access to bookmarks anymore. The sidebar could easily toggle between the two. I've sent feedback. It was clearly ignored. Maybe Apple will get punished on whatever browser market share they caught up with after making Safari 14, because that release actually had mainstream appeal. Now they're back to being unique with this design failure.

By the way, keep covering this in the press. I hope Apple's Safari team sees what a failure they created.
 
Last edited:
Anchoring on your message but many others have alluded to the same concern about being too square for changes…

There’s a book, “The Design of everyday Things” where one of the key takeaways is that when an user has a difficulty using anything (say, basic opening of a door or a drawer) concluding that it was “user error” or “too old for novelty” or similar is a scapegoat, laziness, bad execution and downright bad design… most of “user error” is mostly just plain bad design that failed to inform its intent.

Context is important, user base is important, if the tabs can’t let the user clearly know if it is active or inactive inside the context of a macOS user interface at large, then that tab is failing majorly at delivering that info.
Another good one is "The World as Design" by Otl Aicher.
 
  • Like
Reactions: amartinez1660
It just doesn't make sense. The tabs are in a weird spot, when the rest of the OS has tabs at the bottom section of every UI. I updated to 15 by mistake, and I don't like it.

As I listen to myself, I just see a newspaper from the Simpsons that says 'Old Man Yells at Cloud'
 
  • Haha
Reactions: dk001
Why? Because you disagree with them? And you're right and they are wrong?

You're more than welcome to disagree with them, but there is a false view on the Internet that if you're "pro-something" that you're a shill, brainwashed or stupid. Some people just like things - that doesn't make them lobotomized. And especially considering how negative forums are - this one included - I always find it refreshing when people are positive about something instead of all the cynicism and negativity.

Again - be as critical as you want, but don't assume that people who aren't have an agenda or are being "sheep".

Personally, I find iJustine to be cheerful and fun. If you dislike her content, don't watch, it's as simple as that.
If you enjoy deep cups of cringe that's fine, though I wouldn't be so proud about it, but thats just me.
 
how does one black ads in October 2021?
im ruming (MacBook Air) catalina, safari 15 with adgurad and ad blocker allowing ads

thanks in advance!
 
Well it's clear what's happened isn't it. The changed shading is fine when used with compact mode (because the active tab is a different shape and size and shows the URL), which is what Apple originally intended, but then people complained about compact mode for some reason so Apple made it optional, and foolishly didn't consider how the new shading would look with identically shaped "tabs" (buttons really).
 
  • Like
Reactions: DesertDrummer
I’m surprised at many of Apple’s design lapses. The app icons as a design system, for example, would get an F in design class. Messages icon is flat design and monochromatic, Photos is multicolored gradients, Camera is a pictograph, Safari is a very detailed compass thing, most icons are an object sitting within the rounded square shape, but notes just fills out the whole square shape. No consistency. The brain has process all that inconsistency which is not helpful when scanning a page of 20 apps. Bad Apple.

I guess I must be superhuman or something, because I manage to find which app I need just fine. Of course, you can always use Spotlight to open the desired app in a couple seconds or just start typing the app name in Launchpad or when clicking on the App stack. I also don't see any issue with the design of the app icons in and of themselves, and I'm pretty anal when it comes to design. I think too many people are complainers in search of a complaint to have when it gets this petty.

As for Safari, if you use Dark Mode on your system, the active tab will be highlighted. Just an FYI in case that might be a viable workaround for you.
 
Oh?

View attachment 1856995
View attachment 1856996

Random pick-a-tab-color game!

Also, the thing Gruber pointed out about "popping" was represented by the bottom-right of the tabs in that grid of awfulness: Though it's the selected tab, it has a lower contrast difference between the text and the tab color, making the text "pop" much less. For the text on the *active* tab to stand out less is an extremely bizarre decision.

Of course in the Private Mode equivalent tab in the upper-right, the opposite is true.

This design language is all over the place. Really beneath Apple's usual standards.
Are you claiming that the color changes without selecting a different tab or any other settings? It’s fine if it enabled with incognito but another if it just changes randomly while using the browser.

As for the text, it doesn’t make sense for the active tab to have higher contrast. There are two things I need to know when looking at tabs:
1. Which is the active tab, and I don’t need to know it’s name since it’s already active.
2. The names of non-active tabs, since I need to know what I might click on.
 
This is what my address bar looks like on my iPhone. Is this supposed to be legible?

7A6F5185-232B-4034-8864-139836459D3F.jpeg
 
So Apple puts in new features that many of us try and just turn them off. The rest leave them turned on, like them or not. You'd have to be a total masochist to let Safari change the color of the title bar based on a website's plumage IMO. So just turn it off in Safari Preferences like I did.

A colleague of mine a long time ago added a tiny feature to utility software we were shipping. I thought it was dumb and turned it off via the app's preferences. I tactfully got around to mentioning it. He said "Oh I just put that in there for the people who aren't happy unless they've got something to complain about" :p

Just turn it off. Oh, and try Dark Mode if you prefer your active tab to be lighter than the others. I went full-time dark mode as soon as it came out.
 
I honestly like the new single-line tab view but the only problem (that is fixable) is that when you open a new tab and start typing in it it's so damn small that half the url or half your search query is cut off.

Could easily fix this by just collapsing all the other tabs smaller when the search field is focused and then I'd be content.
 
If you enjoy deep cups of cringe that's fine, though I wouldn't be so proud about it, but thats just me.

If you enjoy insulting people for having a different taste, behind the shield of online anonimity that’s fine, though I wouldn’t be so proud about it, but that’s just me.
 


Safari 15's controversial new design on the Mac has led to complaints about the way the browser indicates which tab is active.

safari-15-tabs.jpg

As illustrated by Daring Fireball's John Gruber, there was never any ambiguity about which tab is active in previous versions of Safari, as an active tab is shown with lighter shading that matches the browser's toolbar.

In Safari 15, however, tabs have a new button-like design with a rounder and more defined appearance. Apple has also inverted its shading of tabs, with an active tab now having darker shading and inactive tabs having lighter shading. The change has annoyed Gruber and other users, as evidenced by this Reddit thread with nearly 1,000 upvotes.

"The design is counterintuitive," wrote Gruber. "What sense does it make that no matter your settings, the active tab is rendered with less contrast between the tab title and the background than background tabs? The active tab should be the one that pops."

In a Safari 15 window with two tabs open, especially from the same website, Gruber said determining which tab is active is basically a guessing game. Gruber acknowledged that it is easier to discern the active tab when more than two tabs are open, but he said the confusion with exactly two tabs should have been reason enough to scrap the design change.

"I can't tell you how many times I closed the tab that I needed because of this," one Reddit user expressed in frustration.

Unfortunately for users who do not like the new design, Apple has not made any changes to the shading of tabs in either the Safari 15.1 beta or the latest version of the experimental Safari Technology Preview browser.

Article Link: Safari 15 Users Say New Tab Design is Counterintuitive

Really? If you sport many (>10) tabs, "Not a flying toy". Please add preference to restore earlier UI thanks.
 
If you enjoy insulting people for having a different taste, behind the shield of online anonimity that’s fine, though I wouldn’t be so proud about it, but that’s just me.
Insulting how? taste != cringe
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.