Lighthouse viewer error flow could be better

[connorjclark]

The following url should take ~1-2m to load an error state:

https://googlechrome.github.io/lighthouse/viewer/?psiurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.khaleejtimes.com%2F&strategy=mobile&category=performance&category=accessibility&category=best-practices&category=seo&utm_source=lh-chrome-ext

a) The error chip is a relatively small thing in the bottom-left corner, which goes away after a few seconds. One could easily leave the page loading, have an error response come back w/ the error warning, the warning go away, then the user finally returns their attention to the page–the page which looks very similar except without a blur.

1. We should make the error indicator stick around until dismissed
2. it should offer a "re-try" button, certainly for ?psiurl, maybe others?

b) The error message given is very generic. Lighthouse returned error: Something went wrong..

1. Is that the exact error PSI is giving us? Can we do better?
2. We should link to a bug report field (perhaps only after one "retry" attempt?)

c) Why is LR having issues with https://www.khaleejtimes.com/ ? It doesn't seem like the typical site we'd have a problem with (it isn't 100% webgl)

ref googleads/publisher-ads-lighthouse-plugin#365 (comment)

[fazilkhaderkt]

Thanks Connor! I'll wait for the response.

[brendankenny]

With PSI now supporting all categories (yay), should we consider retiring/redirecting ?psi= urls? Even for good runs the user experience is definitely better over on pagespeed.web.dev (instant field data, etc).

The only feature parity issue I can think of is being able to save json, which I can't imagine is a super important workflow for PSI results in particular, but we also don't have analytics for that. Maybe it could be a new PSI feature? :)

[connorjclark]

That's a great point. Let's wait for PWA to be "taken care of" though :)

So change the extension... And also maybe js redirect viewer psiurl?

[connorjclark]

@exterkamp requested a ?utm_campaign=lh-extension.

Couple more thoughts on above though... There isn't exactly parity here, even disregarding categories. Viewer has the three dot menu, which importantly has a copy json / export as html feature lacking in PSI. So no sharing (until permalinks), and even then no getting at the JSON.

We could consider a toggle in the extension to load one or the other... or think about how to get those extra features into PSI... or an "open in viewer"? button to the PSI report. Or be OK with losing this.

[fazilkhaderkt]

Hi Connor,

Hope you are doing well.

Quick one: When I run the lighthouse in the fresh newly opened incognito browser, it still shows me the issue as shown in the below attached image..

Many Thanks!
Fazil

[connorjclark]

We want a couple things in PSI before changing the extension:

• "Copy JSON" button, next to "Open Treemap"
• Maybe "Open in Viewer" for all else, just in case?

We should also drop PWA category from the extension.

---

All the error handling improvements above still stand, except for a "retry" option (no sense in retrying a failed gist or jsonurl or whatever...). Still would impact direct usage of Viewer, just not extension users (with above plan to change ext to go to PSI directly).

[fazilkhaderkt]

Hi Connor,

Hope you are doing well. :)

I'm able to download the Lighthouse HTML report directly. Yayyyy!

Thank you for easing and resolving the issues. Appreciate it so much.

Quick one: Could you please guide me, whom/how should I contact Google Ads/DoubleClick team so that I get help in solving the issues?

As always, appreciate your help & support. :)

Best regards,
Fazil