back to article Google tests hiding Chrome extension icons by default, developers definitely not amused by the change

Google is testing a user-interface change that will hide Chrome extensions by default, which is not going down well with developers. Instead of allowing extension icons to appear one after another to the right of the omnibox – the input box for URLs and search queries – the Chrome Extensions Platform team is trying out a …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    When will they learn?

    Pissing off the developers whom write mods for your software that extends functionality, enables bits you may have never considered, and allows the user of your product to do the things they need to do rather than the things you think they need to do is a great way to cause those developers to leave for greener pastures.

    Those developers go to your competition, the people using your product start leaving for companies that offer the things they need (rather than the ones you think they need), and you quickly become just another Microsoft swirling the toilet bowl of fail.

    Hey Google! Remember when your motto used to be "Don't Be Evil"? Why do you insist on making MS look good in comparison?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: When will they learn?

      Some valid points AC, but...

      Where are the 'Greener Pastures' of which you speak? Chrome is very popular.

      'Those developers go to your competition' Again, Chrome is very popular.

      'Microsoft swirling the toilet bowl of fail.' MS seem to be doing OK, not anywhere near the outfall as far as I can see.

      'Don't Be Evil' Old news, not even worth mentioning these days. Sorry for mentioning it.

      At least with Chrome you can see which extensions are installed.

      For example IE can hide an extension from the user so you don't even know it is installed.

      Snow Software being an example, that is legit software but it is an example of a user being denied access to view what is going on in their browser. Fine, install it and restrict use but don't allow hiding it.

      There is only one valid reason for hiding extensions from the user, and that is nefarious activity.

      If your employer wants to install stuff you can't tamper with that 's OK, but things should never be completely hidden from the user.

      1. Cuddles

        Re: When will they learn?

        "'Those developers go to your competition' Again, Chrome is very popular."

        How quickly people forget. Netscape was very popular. Internet explorer was very popular. Firefox was very popular. Chrome is currently popular. But this time it will stick and nothing Chrome does could possibly drive people away? Chrome will continue to be popular right up until it suddenly isn't. No single small change will be the cause all on its own, but things like this will certainly be among the contributing factors when it inevitably happens.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: When will they learn?

          Netscape and IE belong to a day when browser functionality was much lower and the volume of code written around specific browsers was small. Chrome is the delivery agent for a vast, many billions of dollars system.

          Why was God able to create the Earth and everything in it in six days* while Microsoft keeps having patch releases? Because God didn't have to deal with an installed base.

          *Not really. It actually took well under 10-43 seconds.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: When will they learn?

            The days were more the versioning system. "day one" is like pre-alpha and "day six" release candidate. As with all programming, schedules are fluid. ;)

          2. Grogan Silver badge

            Re: When will they learn?

            Yes, browsers are like an operating system environment within themselves these days. Especially on platforms (e.g. Linux) where you can't rely on system library versions working correctly and have to bundle static for a lot of things.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Childcatcher

              Re: When will they learn?

              "Especially on platforms (e.g. Linux) where you can't rely on system library versions working correctly and have to bundle static for a lot of things."

              Say whaaaaaat? Sounds like you missed the entire age of Internet Explorer + O.S., because depending on a web browsers libraries to make your code work, well... just be glad you missed it. If Chrome OS wasn't non-stop being shoved down peoples throats by a multi-billion dollar spy company, even that would of died off years ago. We've all used Chrome OS, yes it works, but it simply just isn't "all that".

              I will say this though, love or hate WASM, at least it brings the finality to all things pondered or incipient to what can and cannot work in a web browser... with no excuses. However, if you're absolutely 100% positive that you've finally found the perfect way to do something in C/C++, just ask somebody else. No matter to all that, just get the popcorn ready for the world meet world conflict when JS scripters crash into C/C++ coders, that could get _VERY_ nasty (in fact, check my icon choice).

        2. bombastic bob Silver badge
          Thumb Up

          Re: When will they learn?

          "No single small change will be the cause all on its own, but things like this will certainly be among the contributing factors when it inevitably happens."

          Death by 1000 cuts (or new, shiny "features" creeping in)

      2. Donn Bly

        Re: When will they learn?

        Where are the greener pastures you ask? Well, Edge has now overtaken Firefox in market share, and runs the same rendering engine as Chrome. Right now that field is looking pretty attractive.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Coat

      @AC Re: When will they learn?

      Hmmmm pissing off developers, or hiding the availability of extensions or what extensions you're running from clueless users?

      I can imagine Google adding their own extensions and later claim you 'opted in'... when caught.

      Sorry, just color me cynical.

    3. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Meh

      Re: When will they learn?

      what about extensions that tighten privacy AGAINST DATA THAT GOOGLE COLLECTS?

      Just thought I'd ask...

  2. Sleep deprived
    Thumb Down

    Now avoiding Chrome everywhere

    For me, Manifest v3 was the turning point. Before that, when I had a problem rendering a page with Firefox, I'd launch Chrome, sometimes with success. Now, I do everything I can to avoid Chrome, both under Windows and Android, instead trying to fix the problem with Firefox, eventually sending them a report with URL and relevant data. Google has become a despicable software publisher with every move making the attached strings ever less subtle.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Now avoiding Chrome everywhere

      Yep. There is a reason that google.com is blocked at my home firewall. I wonder what that can be?

      Perhaps it has something to do with their business? The one that is there to suck the life out of all of us just so that they can sling adverts back at us. Stop the world... I wanna get off.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Now avoiding Chrome everywhere

      Google are not now, nor have ever been a software publisher.

      They are a personal information slurping ad slinger. Always have been, always will be.

      If they hadn't built their offices on top of a mountain of cash, their mediocre software offerings would have disappeared a long time ago.

      1. Glen 1

        Re: Now avoiding Chrome everywhere

        "mediocre software offerings"

        If you know of a better search engine, or better maps software, I'm listening.

        I already have alternatives for the rest.

    3. Bruce Ordway

      Re: Now avoiding Chrome everywhere

      >> Manifest v3

      Kind of like how Quantum killed all my enthusiasm for Firefox?

      I'm not sure we can totally avoid Chrome anymore?

      I've ended up at the point where I use several browsers/systems depending on the task I'm performing.

      In general I'd prefer to break a web pages by default rather than give up any of my control.

      So.... the people who create the add-ons like NoScript, AdBlock are much appreciated by me.

    4. RegGuy1 Silver badge

      Re: Now avoiding Chrome everywhere

      AdBlock Plus and No Script.

      That is all.

  3. cornetman Silver badge
    FAIL

    So Google wants to make users more aware of what extensions are doing...by hiding them?

  4. Dan 55 Silver badge
    Facepalm

    What happened to UI designers?

    Did the all the good ones get put on the B-Ark and all the bad ones stay to inflict TIFKAM and web UIs on us?

  5. Briantist69

    Oooh, I like this.

    I see with my 13 extensions, this is a much better way to operate.

    The alternative that the ones you don't use appear in the three dots menu, which is OK until you have quite a few in there and it doesn't really feel like good UI.

    Also, really like to know that I can see which ones (here it's Adblocker Ultimate, Google Dictionary, Google Translate, JSON Viewer) are active on the page I'm looking at.

    Google does seem to blow hot and cold over "pins" in the UI, so interesting to see them in the Chrome UI.

  6. Pascal Monett Silver badge
    Flame

    Once again, the question is choice

    Why is it UI tinkerers think that they have the ultimate wisdom and impose their worldview on their users ?

    Put it in the settings and make it a choice the user can decide to implement. Why is it so God-damned hard for you people to understand that ?

    You think you've got a nifty, useful idea ? Start by making an add-on, see how many users download it and base your actions on the result.

    But, above all, STOP FUCKING WITH MY HABITS.

    1. Jason Bloomberg Silver badge
      FAIL

      Re: Once again, the question is choice

      make it a choice the user can decide to implement. Why is it so God-damned hard for you people to understand that ?

      As I see it; there aren't enough up-votes in the universe needed to give that the applause it deserves.

      I don't understand it. When I make a software change and there's a choice of "this or that" and it really matters to users; I don't make a choice because I know it won't be right for all users and I believe all users should be able to make their own choice, not have it forced upon them. I'll choose a default which I believe will suit the majority but that's as far as I go. And, with there being a choice, it doesn't matter much if I get that wrong, it's easy enough to change later.

      And why would I even waste my time deciding what it should be when I can leave that to the user?

      I have never understood what makes people such control freaks.

      1. Jamie Jones Silver badge

        Re: Once again, the question is choice

        6 million times YES.

        The worst thing about dumbing down of interfaces is the actual loss of functionality for those that want it.

        Remember when the paypal site looked and operated like a proper banking site?

      2. Pirate Dave Silver badge
        Pirate

        Re: Once again, the question is choice

        "I don't make a choice because I know it won't be right for all users and I believe all users should be able to make their own choice, not have it forced upon them."

        That's how software USED to be, before the age of the dumbed-down smartphone UI. Now, your choice, my choice, everyone's choice, is irrelevant to The Designers. Even Choice itself is bad. And {deity} forbid you have an opinion that in any way runs counter to the Opinions of The Designers - doing so proves that you are of lesser intelligence than The Designers and that you need to change your opinion to align with that of The Designers.

        They (Google and Mozilla) could leave these choices in their about:config and leave the software intact that works on those settings. That would let us keep doing things the way we like. Hell, I wouldn't even care if the default for a choice was the polar opposite of what I'd have it set to. I just want to set my choice and have the software work the way I want it to (in many cases, work the way it ALWAYS WORKED BEFORE {this} VERSION). But that's not how The Designers work anymore. Their Choice is THE Choice, end of discussion.

  7. Krassi

    obvious monetisation ahead

    Shortly, Google announces that (only)members of their premium trusted extension program will have the ability to place pinned icons on the toolbar.

    And whispers quietly - there is a membership fee for this program.

    Bit surprised El Reg cynicism didn't spot this .

  8. IGotOut Silver badge

    I presume....

    This is to make it harder for you to see how much of Google's tracking the like of Ghostery is blocking

  9. Zippy´s Sausage Factory
    Facepalm

    Extensions are hidden by default?

    That'll please a lot of people. Such as malware writers, crypto mining junkware developers, password thieves, spyware purveyors...

    "I can't see any possible downside to this, whatsoever. Nothing could possibly go wrong." - the same people who thought ActiveX was a good idea, probably.

  10. anthonyhegedus Silver badge

    Remember IE toolbars anybody?

    Why does this remind me of the toolbars that used to appear in internet explorer? I see very few chrome extensions that are any use. Many of them block changing your search engine or add search engines called ‘secure search’ so you think it’s genuine. Just like internet explorer, it’s a magnet for malware and fake unwanted programs. Why on earth did google allow addons and extensions to so easily disable changing the search engine anyway? And why do they make it hard to find the options to set it back (well, hard for the sort of user who loads these by accident in the first place). I wonder....

  11. Grogan Silver badge

    Piss off Google... I hate your software because of stupid decisions like this. I don't use Chrome/Chromium anywhere, anymore. Vivaldi is still a top notch browser, but they are going to find it harder and harder to maintain the Chromium backend without all the unwanted changes, eventually.

    I use Firefox on mobile too nowadays. It's a somewhat slower renderer (and there's a bit more penalty for using Ublock Origin... though the benefits of blocking crap outweigh that where relevant) but its worth it for having a better user interface and support for such extensions. Know what I hate most about mobile browsers? They all insist on loading your last session. Firefox is the only one I know of that has a setting to just make it start with my specified home page and not load tabs from the last session.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Anticipating how Google's security and privacy-focused platform......

    I'm not so concerned with anyone pissing off developers - it's kinda sport - but actually believing that google is acting on our behalf is laughable! They care about our security and privacy about as much as devs do. ZERO!

  13. YetAnotherJoeBlow

    This sums it up...

    "Be prepared for your extension to not have the host permissions you expect"

    What that hell kind of statement is that? This is not a game of hide and seek. Jesus Google moderate the greed. F'ing control freaks.

  14. sinsi

    Security by obscurity?

    "Our goal with this new UI is to make it easier for users to see what extensions can access their data,"

    See by hiding. I see...

  15. Aussie Doc
    Pint

    Shirley not

    I must have had too many ----->

    So, in order to make it easier for users to see which of their extensions can access their data, google will actually hide them.

    Nope, I must be way under the affluence of incohol for this to make sense.

    Edited to acknowledge a few commentards have said pretty much the same thing.

    Still doesn't make it right, Google.

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