Products · Pattern or everyday thing
Context menus
Raised as a usability problem by 20 people on Hacker News over 19 years (2008–2026), in 18 threads.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads in the last 5 years.
Every issue, all time, most people first
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 20 complaints
- Right-click menus become cumbersome as the number of actions grows2026-05-13
- Most people don't discover or understand right-clicking; context menus aren't obvious2024-01-26
- Accidentally opening new tabs by releasing right-click; took a while to understand what happened2024-01-20
- Installing it on Windows was extremely painful and documentation was lacking2021-12-24
- Options are listed by name only, with no explanation of what they do2021-12-24
- Poor, undocumented features make it hard to find things in source files2021-05-27
- Context menus nested four layers deep are cluttered and hard to navigate2020-11-17
- Hard to get anything done; sparse online info and inadequate official docs2019-05-29
- Hard to find documentation for the software2019-01-09
- Users don't discover context menus because they are hidden and inconsistent across contexts2018-02-07
- Google search entry in right-click menu cannot be configured or removed2017-12-19
- Windows installer is broken and download links lead to 404s or tar files2016-04-11
- Complex actions hidden behind right-click and middle-click are easy for people to miss2013-10-19
- Modern TeX variant can be maddening to use2012-01-12
- Most non-advanced users never discover features hidden in context menus2011-12-26
- Seniors get confused by context menus and mix them with menu bar actions2011-08-29
- Functionality hidden in right-click menus is never shown in main menus, so users can't discover it2010-08-15
- Older users press the wrong button, using index finger instead of middle finger for right-click2010-07-19
- Users don't discover or remember that right-clicking reveals available commands2010-07-18
- Each app handles right-click differently, with no standard, and some browser menus break the app illusion2008-09-25