Allow users disabling gesture based features

[Mugurell]

Why/User Benefit/User Problem

Based on user requests for an option to disable gesture based features we should allow an easy way of toggling:

• pull to refresh in browser
• dynamic toolbar (top / bottom)
• swipe toolbar horizontally to change tabs
• swipe toolbar up to show open tabs (to be implemented after Swipe up the bottom bar to see the tab menu #11862)

What/Requirements

New toggles for the above features.
Strawman mockup - #10240 (comment):

String resources - #13442 (comment)

Here are strings for all four gestures. Can you confirm that the first two will be what will be implemented? The ones from the mock are outdated.

• Pull to refresh
• Scroll to hide toolbar
• Swipe toolbar sideways to switch tabs
• Swipe toolbar up to open tabs

Acceptance Criteria (how do I know when I’m done?)

Users can easily find the settings to enable / disable gesture based features.

┆Issue is synchronized with this Jira Task

[Mugurell]

@ UX how should this be organized?

• In new "Gestures" settings screen
  • In a new "Gestures" settings screen?
  • In a new "Gestures" section?
  • Individual toggles?
• Should the above be inside Settings -> Accessibility or in a new page inside Settings?

[brampitoyo]

@Mugurell Would you be able to describe some of our user issues with pull to refresh and dynamic toolbar?

I assume that pull to refresh might interfere with certain site header, and dynamic toolbar would sometimes not minimise?

[Mugurell]

Basically:

• user gestures trigger pull down / dynamic toolbar when they shouldn't (horizontal scrolls, zoom motions)
• there still edgecases with websites for which pull down/dynamic toolbar are triggered when they shouldn't / are not triggered when they should.
• for the dynamic toolbar there are indeed cases in which it interferes with the page layout, like [Bug] Dynamic Nav Bar leaves white space on certain websites #8768

And there are users that requested an option to disable these: #8847, #9719

[AmyYLee]

@brampitoyo to follow-up

[brampitoyo]

@Mugurell I don’t see this as a big issue for two reasons:

1. Chrome has both pull-to-refresh and dynamic toolbar
2. These gestures are fully consistent with Material Design guidelines:
   • https://material.io/components/app-bars-bottom#behavior
   • https://material.io/design/platform-guidance/android-swipe-to-refresh.html#behavior-placement

In the interest of customisability – but being aware of feature creep – if there’s sufficient interest and problem to address, I’d consider adding those options under Settings.

---

Toolbar auto-hide

It makes sense, as written on #8847 (comment), to ”add this setting below the one that let you choose if you want the toolbar at the top or at the bottom“.

Pull-to-refresh

I also think that we should put it under the “Customise” sub-page.

---

@betsymi do you have any opinion on:

• Whether it makes sense, in the first place, to have a setting to turn off toolbar auto-hide and pull-to-refresh gestures?
• The placement of these settings
• The name/strings that we should call them

[brampitoyo]

Posting a strawman mockup of what the gesture settings may look like under the “Customize” Settings sub-page. CC @betsymi.

[kbrosnan]

This looks really good Bram! I like breaking out gestures into their own heading which fixes a problem I saw with information hierarchy in pr #11678. The pr made it look like scrolling the toolbar only applied to the bottom toolbar. Should we tweak the wording a little? Down is used to describe two different gestures. Pull down to reload sites the user gesture is tap-hold and drag down. Scroll down to hide toolbar the user gesture is tap-hold and drag up. How about Scroll to hide address bar ?

[paritosh9199]

Any progress on this issue? When will the option for disabling the scroll down to hide toolbar be added?

[kbrosnan]

The pull request adds text strings. The project is in a string freeze for a while. Until the freeze is lifted the pull request is not eligible to land. In addition it requires some changes to bring it into line with what Bram showed.

[brampitoyo]

Thanks @kbrosnan. For the string change, I will ask @betsymi to comment on these.

[Mugurell]

According to the original issue, eventually there will also be a Swipe toolbar up to show open tabs, which would suggest Swipe toolbar to switch tabs won't make sense without the sideways.

Do you know of the issue for this? Please link if you know where that is being discussed

It's mentioned in the first comment on this ticket.
Swipe toolbar up to show open tabs is to be added in #11862

[Mugurell]

This ticket already got verified by @cadeyrn (thanks!) who found

• [Bug] "scroll to hide toolbar" option does not work (with bottom toolbar) #14902
• [Bug][LeakCanary] OpenInAppOnboardingObserver leaks SwipeGestureLayout #14903
  Can it be verified by QA also?

[sv-ohorvath]

Verified on Nightly 9/10 on different devices and besides the already filled issues, I didn't find anything new. I'll close this as fixed.
Devices:
Pixel 4 (Android 10)
Nexus 9 (Android 7.1)
HTC Desire 820 (Android 6.0.1)

[paritosh9199]

The url bar seems to autohide even after disabling autohide on scroll in settings.

Device: OnePlus 7
Nightly 200910 06:07 (Build #2015763059)
AC: 58.0.20200908130811, 52ac53ba1
GV: 82.0a1-20200907094115
AS: 61.0.13

[sv-ohorvath]

@paritosh9199 That was already mentioned here: #10240 (comment)
Thanks for checking!

[andreicristianpetcu]

Scroll to hide toolbar only works for top bar, not bottom bar.

[hwinnemoe]

@andreicristianpetcu see #14902

[Imerion]

@andreicristianpetcu That is odd. How come? I really prefer the bottom bar since it is possible to reach without using both hands, but I really want it to stay there at all times and not hide.

[andreicristianpetcu]

@lmerion I expect it to work the same for both top and bottom. Top works, bottom has a bug mentioned above your comment.

[Imerion]

@andreicristianpetcu Ah, I see! Sorry! I was a bit to quick there and missed the post with the bug. I thought the behaviour was intentional.

[brabebhin]

Good work. Nightly firefox now feels like a proper, respectable browser, not the toy the live version feels like.

[Mugurell]

Issues related to the static bottom toolbar after this:

• [Bug] "scroll to hide toolbar" option does not work (with bottom toolbar) #14902
• [Bug] Youtube Mobile page bottom toolbar float when Toolbar on Top and Scroll to hide toolbar is off. #14974
• [Bug] Disabled "Scroll to hide toolbar" option leads to bottom toolbar obscuring snackbars #14982

[Imerion]

Sorry if I'm not following what is happening here. This worked perfectly for me in the last beta (Blackberry KeyOne, Android 8.1) and made browsing so much smoother and more efficient, but in the latest beta the options are gone again. Is this just a temporary removal to fix bugs or what is happening?

[cadeyrn]

@Imerion see https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/releases/tag/v81.1.1-beta.4:

Disables gestures controls (which had some problems in Nightly) #15005

[Imerion]

@cadeyrn Ok, so they will be brought back once those issues are fixed? Because i really believe these options are necessary for usability and accessability reasons.