Scrollbar

[bl-ue]

@Yutyo will you please enable GitHub pages on https://github.com/Yutyo/tldr-pages.github.io and set it to use the scrollbar branch, so that we can preview it at https://yutyo.github.com/tldr-pages.github.io?

[tansiret]

@Yutyo will you please enable GitHub pages on https://github.com/Yutyo/tldr-pages.github.io and set it to use the scrollbar branch, so that we can preview it at https://yutyo.github.com/tldr-pages.github.io?

Sure: https://yutyo.github.io/tldr-pages.github.io/

[tansiret]

I'm not certain that it's a good idea to use our own custom scrollbar as this site is not a web application, in facts, I believe it's a single-page, static website.

That said, I think the scrollbar self looks lovely and fits perfectly with austere, monochromatic black and white theme. 👍🏻

I think its good to have custom scrollbar as many modern sites have it and it isn't even a big deal. Its supported by many browsers and only some tiny lines of css.

[sbrl]

Nice, @Yutyo! The high contrast is a good thing with respect to accessibility. Are there any other accessibility concerns we need to be aware of here?

[tansiret]

Nice, @Yutyo! The high contrast is a good thing with respect to accessibility. Are there any other accessibility concerns we need to be aware of here?

I will also add light-dark UI feature that gets changed depending on browser theme and some custom settings just like the one Duckduckgo has in a different PR. I also think about adding a hamburger menu for stuff like donation, merch (If you want. I will ask in Gitter) and credits in another PR as well.

[waldyrious]

Hmm, I'm not convinced that this change in style is beneficial. It doesn't seem to serve any purpose other than aesthetics (please correct me if I'm wrong), and while it's certainly eye-catching, I'm afraid it can be a little confusing, especially when combined with the black github corner. Here's how it appears in the browsers I have immediate access to:

Chrome:

Firefox:

Safari:

I could agree with the Firefox style, but the others are just too flat — the scrollbar doesn't stand out as an interactive control, but sort of disappears into the website as if just a design quirk.

Maybe a different color might work better, but IMO I'd still be hesitant to agree with this change unless there's a justification other than "it looks cool" (which, to be clear, it does! 😅).

[tansiret]

Maybe a different color might work better, but IMO I'd still be hesitant to agree with this change unless there's a justification other than "it looks cool" (which, to be clear, it does! sweat_smile).

What type of color combination would you suggest? Asking cuz I don't have much in mind.

[waldyrious]

What type of color combination would you suggest? Asking cuz I don't have much in mind.

I haven't given it much thought either, because as I said, I'm more inclined towards not customizing the scrollbar at all. With that caveat, I guess something closer to the usual appearance of scrollbars, i.e. gray instead of pitch black, might work better. Or perhaps something using the same accent color as our logo... not sure, just spitballing some ideas.

[tansiret]

I have updated the colors.

@waldyrious I think your firefox is old btw. The custom scrollbar need to look like the others in the new version.

[tansiret]

I'm also not sure this adds much benefit. I also get the same style as @waldyrious in the latest Firefox. However, that's unsurprising as the width won't affect Firefox as it doesn't use WebKit.

Firefox requires a different attribution for scrollbar, where width is not editable.

About benefits, having a custom scrollbar is just something more than not having custom scrollbar.

[tansiret]

Chromium:

Firefox:

Safari:

[owenvoke]

On Firefox, I actually prefer the default. But I think that's just because it fits nicely with the rest of the light theme.

[sbrl]

I think there's something to be said for keeping with the system default, as it's more familiar for users. But I'll go with whatever everyone else decides here.

[mebeim]

Weighing in late, but I don't really see a good reason to have a custom scrollbar. It only has the chance to be bad UX for some users (old browsers, mobile browsers that don't even need a scrollbar, etc) and it seems unneeded for a website such as this one. I would rather stick with the default one.

[tansiret]

My point about the necessity of scrollbar:

Yes, its not an emergent need but will make the project look more professional. It also doesn't cause any issues in browsers that don't support it and doesn't show up at all in devices with no scrollbar. It will be just like now but with custom scrollbar if the browser supports it.

[mebeim]

Huh, gotta be honest, I didn't notice that it does not show up on mobile devices where it's unneeded. Also good point that on old browsers the CSS would just not render at all. Let's just say that even though I would not classify it as a "necessity", I'm not opposed to it. Hate to sound neutral as it's kind of a grey area if we don't reach an agreement, but oh well...

[waldyrious]

I hate even more to sound like a grumpy old man, but I really don't see the benefit of making the style change just because we can. "It looks more professional" isn't a good reason IMO, as it is entirely subjective, and indeed I disagree with that assessment. But at the end of the day, it's not a big deal, so I won't veto the update if others agree.

[vladimyr]

Here are my 2 cents:

• Advertising it as advancement in professionalism is disingenuous IMHO.
• It does look aesthetically pleasing and falls back gracefully I guess.
• I'm not an a11y expert but to the best of my knowledge styling it using CSS with respect to contrast and having reasonable clickable width shouldn't be an issue.

Now when I do the math - it doesn't seem to have any minuses, it has (subjective) pluses cause you know not everyone's perception of beauty is the same, overall resulting in yes from me.

[SethFalco]

I hate even more to sound like a grumpy old man

Just noting that I don't mind sounding like a grumpy old man. :laughing:

---

Pretty old PR, but I want to put my thoughts down and revive it, so we can decide if this is going to get merged or not.

In my opinion, we shouldn't merge this.

• Changing things for the sake of changing them doesn't benefit anyone. It just turns something that everyone was very familiar with to something unfamiliar and unintuitive.
• The scrollbar is something that browsers have had a lot of time to get right. Not sure if it's worth adding the extra maintenance to undermine that.
• Reviewing the screenshots (though I haven't checked if it's an accurate representation of how it would look now), it does look fine, but so does each respective browser's default.
• It may be a tiny amount of CSS, but hey it's still more bytes that can be easily avoided.

and it isn't even a big deal

I will also add light-dark UI feature that gets changed depending on browser theme and some custom settings just like the one Duckduckgo has in a different PR.

In my opinion, it's wrong to say "isn't even a big deal" because we have to maintain it. For example, when the default browser styles change, or as alluded to by yourself, theming.

As your PR is right now, the up and down arrow on Chromium has disappeared, which users of Chromium are used to for scrollable sites.

Even if we run with the fact it's not a big deal, then it's also not a big deal to leave it as it is.

About benefits, having a custom scrollbar is just something more than not having custom scrollbar.

Changing the aesthetics of a utility that visitors are used to for no practical benefit is a con, not a benefit.

[sbrl]

I agree with @SethFalco on this. We seem to have agreement here - plus this is a pretty old PR as previously mentioned, so I'm going to close this PR for now.

We can always reopen if there's more to discuss.