Jump to top of page functionality missing in web browser

[Dominik]

I would like to propose that "jump to top of page" be considered for inclusion in the web browser. This is something I'm really missing from Ubuntu Touch on my bq E5.

On iOS touching the top of the screen will jump to the top of the page.
On PS Vita there's a button on the toolbar that does the same thing.

Some web pages will have menus or search at the top of the page and I believe it would be a good idea to allow users to quickly get back to the top.

The way iOS does this clearly seems unsuited to Ubuntu with its top menu bar. I would like to propose two ways to implement this:

1. A button next to the back/forward buttons, like so: <^ [address] or <>^ [address]
or
2. A sufficiently vigorous swipe down would send the page directly to the top.

I like the 2nd option more, since it won't clutter the top bar with an additional button and I believe users are bound to discover the functionality by themselves anyway. A fast, vigorous swipe down would be used by the user exactly in that situation - when trying to quickly get back to the top of the page. Right now a couple or more swings are necessary on long pages (e.g. www.gamingonlinux.com), plus having to wait for the page to scroll.

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UX Comment:

The direction of chevrons have fairly strong meanings in our established visual language (and in all cases indicate some form of navigation, not the repositioning of content).

That said, fast scrolling is a very desirable facility when viewing very long web-sites. As such, of the two proposed solutions I'd recommend we go with the second -

"2. A sufficiently vigorous swipe down would send the page directly to the top."

i.e. when down swipes are sufficiently vigorous, immediate scrolling to the top of the page occurs with sufficient speed so as to appear almost instantaneous.

[Peter Bittner (peter-bittner)]

+1 for vigorous swipe, definitely. No clutter, please.

[Olivier Tilloy (osomon)]

Adding an oxide task, as this kind of behaviour needs to be implemented by oxide.

[Olivier Tilloy (osomon)]

Marked invalid for webbrowser-app, as there’s nothing to do there, all that’s required is to implement this behaviour in oxide.