Grumpy Website

nikitonsky: I’m always puzzled by those two menus in Google Inbox. One has tags/assignments, other one forward/reply. If you think about it really hard for some time, it kind of makes sense (thread vs individual letter). But after a day or two you forget it again. The worst part is, you kind of need both and they are both absolutely identical

freetonik: Google Drive File Stream is a brand new software project, yet it fails to comprehend the oldest thing in UX: tell users the things that make sense in the user's world, not in software's world.

Here I have trouble updating some items. So, it was deleted and a copy has been recreated.

I have NO idea what this might even mean…

dmitriid: I don't think there's a single person in this world who understands how Google Accounts work. At one point even Google's own developers give up and go: screw this, we're only letting one logged in user per service.

All of the screenshots are from the same browser, on the same day, with the same users logged in:

— Your accounts are listed in the order in which you logged in. Except when they aren't. And except when they are grouped for some reason.

— A service will look at `/u/index` (or `/?authuser=index`, or `/?u=index`) in the URL and choose that user. If your account X is in position 3 in the list today, and it's in position 1 tomorrow, a link with `/u/3` will log you in with different users.

— That's why links to events and to documents will often tell you that you're not authorized to view them, because the currently logged in user is whatever.

— Except Youtube. Only the first user on the list can watch Youtube. Even if you change accounts. And if your account isn't authorized to watch Youtube, too bad. Log out of all accounts, and log in with the account that can watch Youtube.

— Except how do you know if your account is authorized? Google will helpfully let you chose between an organizational and a personal account. Which is which and what's the difference? Who knows. Personal account will gladly automatically create a `something%whatever@gtempaccount.com` for you. What?

— Except when you arrive at one of the pages that lists your logins, and you chose a login, you will get an "We are sorry, but you do not have access to this service". Unless you select "Sign in with a different account", and sign in with the same very account you tried to select previously. Then everything will be ok.

— Unless, of course, the service will end up randomly selecting a different account from the list of logged in accounts.

— And, of course, when you switch accounts some services will do one of the following: open the other account in a new tab (Google Docs), open the other account in the same tab (Google Analytics), will totally ignore your selection and stay with the same account in the same tab (Youtube, most of the time). Or will not even allow you to have more than one account (BigQuery).

*Update (April 2018)*. Google Forms doesn't even let you switch accounts. It will just show an error message stating "you have no permission to access this form, ask the person who sent you the link to send you a correct link". Of course, there's no way to do that.

*Update (April 2018) via @reneritchie* Click on Google Drive link. Go to Drive app. Get booted out of Drive app and sent to the web to login. Login, and get told the file is unavailable unless I log out of every other account first.

nikitonsky: I used to be a huge fan of “Log in with” buttons. Hey, I don’t need to create an account! I don’t need to invent and remember a password! Developers don’t need to manage my account details, Google/Facebook take that headache which which is also probably orders of magnitude more secure.

Then the first problem hit me: I couldn’t remember which of the buttons I used because I had all the accounts. So I made a rule to always log in with Google (I think, I don’t remember). What if Google is not among the options? Well lucky guess then.

Then Facebook became assholes so I removed my account. Google followed shortly (I still have the account but prefer not to use it if I can). I still have twitter but how long before they turn into user-spying crap? Or run out of money? Nobody knows. So I stopped using those buttons altogether.

Morale? If you’re a developer, always let users login via email. It’s not hip, it’s our last hope to keep internet vendor-neutral. Complicated, you say? You can send a direct login link with a unique token each time, no need to manage passwords at all. Simple and elegant. That’s how Grumpy implements login for authors, and it only took me a few hours to implement. Sure someone at Product Hunt huge dev team has a few spare hours somewhere?

If you’re a user, consider using email for all your authentication needs. It’s easier than you think and will last longer than any of other alternatives. Email also won’t spy on you (unless you’re using GMail, of course, but that would be YOUR choice). For convenience, I started to use password manager which generates and remembers a unique password for each website. That way even if one site is compromised rest of your accounts is still perfectly safe.

nikitonsky: In an attempt to save menu space, Google Docs moved Table menu under Format. Is it an obvious place to look for Insert new row? Given that rest of the menu is, well, about formatting: colors, styles, align?

At least now they have enough space to spell “All changes saved in Drive” which is no doubt the shortest form of the message there can be

nikitonsky: Well this is annoying. Some app has been begging me to enter my password for Google account. In a nameless popup over everything else. With no way to figure out which app it is for. Suspicious as hell.

UPD: seems it was Apple asking for Apple ID (got that by intentionally entering wrong password). How the hell was I supposed to figure that out?

dmitriid: Yes. That's the entirety of "More filters" in the desktop browser version of Google Maps.

No, it doesn't change if you search for, say, Barcelona.

Yes, the app has many more filters immediately available such as "open now", "relevance", "distance".

No, this is entirely within Google's complete and utter disregard for its own design guidelines and general disregard for Maps (see previous, grumpy.website/post/0QqUsEQvJ)

nikitonsky: “Don’t use your real name” — Why? I like my name. What’s wrong with it?

“You won’t be able to change your Stadia Name later” — Is this the reason? Because in real life, you know, I can change my real name. But some 10-byte id somewhere in a table that nothing in life depends on, THAT can’t be changed?

Grow up, Google.

Thanks @dmitriid for the picture

nikitonsky: So Twitter wants me to read an article before I retweet it? Only that I am the one who wrote it, and I clearly have it open in a very next tab right there.

I understand that Twitter wants to be Google and track what everybody is doing, but, I mean, you can’t reliably know what I have read! What’s next — quiz on article’s content?

nikitonsky: does anyone know how Google came up with the idea to fusion weather and news into the same app? As a result, it’s impossible to use it to actually learn what the weather is like.

Granted, it opens up on the weather screen first, but it’s the weather at some random location. In the case above, I was travelling in Vienna, lived in Moscow before that, and it showed me the weather in Novosibirsk (twice).

So I used search, right? And it fulfilled that: it showed me the Vienna news, apparently.

Whatever alien logic it is, I went to settings, only to find that city selection is neither in General nor in Country & Language. It is possible to specify a city, but you have to go to “Local sections” and configure weather and news at the same time.

I know Google is very proud of their Search business, but is searching for weather report too much to ask?