Why do you commonly right click on a link? To open a link in new window or tab.
I am sure you must have tried to open mails in yahoo, rediff or hotmail in a new window.
“Open in a new window” is the first option in the right click menu.
But try doing this in Gmail –
I am sure you must have tried to open mails in yahoo, rediff or hotmail in a new window.
“Open in a new window” is the first option in the right click menu.
But try doing this in Gmail –
“This frame” is the last third option on the right click menu, on selecting that another menu comes up, from where you need to select “Open frame in a new tab/window” option. On clicking that, the selected mail wont open in a new window, but the inbox (very same page) opens in a new window.
- You land up clicking once more to read a mail from your inbox.
- “Open in a new window/ tab” should have been first or second option in the main menu instead of being in the sub menu.
- Standard “Page” word should have been used instead of “Frame” as Gmail is targeted to not just techie people, who understand the concept of frame.
Browsing through your mails takes more time, as user tends to navigate in the single window only.
Below are the screenshots of yahoo mail, rediff mail and hotmail showing how easy it is for the user to navigate and read their mails.
3 comments:
The menu you get when right clicking on a link or a page is actually controlled by the browser/application. Its the browser's (application) menu which is shown when you right click on different elements not a menu created by gmail. You can check this by right clicking on the gmail inbox on both IE and firefox. Also right click on different elements on the page like text links, images with and without links, text; You will get different menu items.
Coming to the problem you have explained, in hotmail, yahoo (old) and rediff, you are actually hovering on an "a" tag which gives the browser right click option "open in new window/tab". Coz the browser recognises your mouse pointer to be on a text link. But in gmail you are not actually hovering/clicking on a text link. You can click anywhere on the gmail inbox row and the mail will open, unlike in other mail inboxes, u have to click on the subject text link. So the browser application is not able to identify where the mouse is and what menu to give you. This is a technical shortcoming on the browser's part.
How to overcome this? May be a custom right click menu like the new yahoo mail. But is the right click interaction actually suggested in a web based application? Its just the browser's feature you were using to open a link in a new window but not actually doing something which will make the application do an action.
The most probable reason of you right clicking on a inbox list entry is to open the mail in a new window. In gmail you can open a mail in a new window if you click on the mail with your shift key pressed. They can probably give this tip as a alt text/tool tip when the mail item is been hovered. So that the user doesnt have to wonder where the "open in new window" disappear on the right click menu. Or may be an icon to click on which suggests that the mail will open in a new window. Its better to build interactions to your application rather than relying on the browser's features to make things work. As you said only techie people use right click. Most of the non techies dont even know that a right click menu exists.
Do i make sense?
Nice point Umesh..!! If thats the case then Gmail should show an icon or link to allow the user to open in a new window, rather than just relying on the browser.
Thanks for this important info.!!!
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