I read the whole article, but I can’t tell, when this feature is added, will it be turned on by default, and if so, will it automatically discard tabs, or will a user that never goes to chrome://discards never know discarding is even there? As a massive tab hoarder I’m kind of worried if it automatically discards tabs for me.
What do we mean by discarding? Well, a discarded tab doesn’t go anywhere. We kill it but it’s still visible on the Chrome tab strip. If you navigate back to a tab that’s been discarded, it’ll reload when clicked. Form content, scroll position and so on are saved and restored the same way they would be during forward/backward tab navigation.
Does that answer the question about not knowing whether it’s there, or were you thinking of other things?
What I get out of the article is that if you’re attentive to what your computer is doing, you’ll notice a page-load delay when you visit a tab that has been discarded, but there will be no other UI indication. If you’re on a high-latency or low-bandwidth connection, that could certainly be distressing, and hopefully there will be some solution for that. Also if the page had an interstitial ad, my guess would be that you’ll see it again, which is :(
In a philosophical sense, I’d interpret this as blurring the line between open tabs and bookmarks. If you have a hundred or so tabs open habitually, as I know many people do, presumably there’s no more than ten or so that you’re going to use on a given day, and it makes little sense to be using a gig of swap for the others - the delay of swapping them back in will in many cases be comparable to the delay of reloading the page anyway. Accumulating tabs seems to often be about reducing cognitive overhead by not having to decide what to do with them until later, so it makes a lot of sense for the computer to watch your habits and decide for you, as long as it does so in a way that won’t be more thinking later.
a discarded tab doesn’t go anywhere. We kill it but it’s still visible on the Chrome tab strip.
Ahh, I must have missed that paragraph and it isn’t explained anywhere else :( The images don’t make it clear either.
Thanks for clearing it up. My worries are entirely unfounded then, I just lack basic comprehension :)
I read the whole article, but I can’t tell, when this feature is added, will it be turned on by default, and if so, will it automatically discard tabs, or will a user that never goes to chrome://discards never know discarding is even there? As a massive tab hoarder I’m kind of worried if it automatically discards tabs for me.
I’m interested in what worries you.
Does that answer the question about not knowing whether it’s there, or were you thinking of other things?
What I get out of the article is that if you’re attentive to what your computer is doing, you’ll notice a page-load delay when you visit a tab that has been discarded, but there will be no other UI indication. If you’re on a high-latency or low-bandwidth connection, that could certainly be distressing, and hopefully there will be some solution for that. Also if the page had an interstitial ad, my guess would be that you’ll see it again, which is :(
In a philosophical sense, I’d interpret this as blurring the line between open tabs and bookmarks. If you have a hundred or so tabs open habitually, as I know many people do, presumably there’s no more than ten or so that you’re going to use on a given day, and it makes little sense to be using a gig of swap for the others - the delay of swapping them back in will in many cases be comparable to the delay of reloading the page anyway. Accumulating tabs seems to often be about reducing cognitive overhead by not having to decide what to do with them until later, so it makes a lot of sense for the computer to watch your habits and decide for you, as long as it does so in a way that won’t be more thinking later.
Ahh, I must have missed that paragraph and it isn’t explained anywhere else :( The images don’t make it clear either.
Thanks for clearing it up. My worries are entirely unfounded then, I just lack basic comprehension :)
Nah, it was a long post, I think it’s totally understandable to have not caught every detail.
That actually makes a lot of sense and sounds like an excellent feature!
I hope I’m not reading in an intent that isn’t there!
I’ve turned on the feature and it is totally awesome! My fears were entirely unfounded. I’m a tab hoarder and it works beautifully for me.