expletive inserted

I really like these two examples of designing web UI elements that blend right into the browser’s chrome.

First we’ve got Google’s Firefox start page, which has probably been my default page for the last n years or so. The simplicity of this trick is great, basically just color matching with a little gradient, but it gives the nice illusion that the Google service links are actually part of your browser. Provides some one of the main benefits of a Firefox extension, without the extension. Sweet.

Next up, we have the little notifcation/chat controls on Facebook. Once again, they’ve disguised their controls to blend right in to an interface that users are comfortable with and have been using for quite some time. Pretty slick. I bet many users don’t even realize that this is part of Facebook.

Anyone else seen some cool examples of this type of thing? Is there a design term to describe this? I guess it’s just attempting to do the something GUI toolkits have done for years and provide a familiar, consistent interface. Neat to see the browser as the target, and maybe (but probably not) warrants some consistent definition and description. I’d like to propose a new term Chromulent Interface Design to describe interfaces built in HTML that attempt to seamlessly blend into the browser’s chrome. Yes, I’m making a Simpson’s reference that has nothing to do with the original joke, but so what. It’s a perfectly cromulent term.

UPDATE: Afshin makes the really great point that this kind of sucks because it makes it quite easy for malicious web developers to build chromulent interfaces that look trustworthy.