I've been a FireFox user since 2005 and I've witnessed the many changes and iterations the browser's gone through. I understand the drive for innovation and new features. However, some of these changes are in detriment to the overall user experience, especially to the established user base. I get the drive to make the UI simpler, but sometimes this comes at the expense of the UX. But what bother me the most is the complete removal or addition of features with no way of reverting back to what we're used to.
Things get changed in a whim because some dev thought it's a frivolous feature and that's it. The removal of the "press enter on an empty search bar" feature is an example of this. It feels like some dev wanted to make some "contribution," removed the feature and that's it. To me, this screams of mediocrity, because there was no thought about the user or any research on its usage. This could perfectly be a toggle. But no, it was just removed because who cares about users.
Another example is the downloads library. There used to be a button you clicked and you got the download history, but now it's hidden behind an additional click. Looks good, but adding more clicks to achieve the same goal is poor UX.
Computers are powerful enough that things can become a toggle in about:config. Not everything needs to be permanently added or removed.
I guess I just want to say that any changes should become a toggle for the sake of the user, because even with telemetry enabled, you don't see the full picture of your users' browsing habits.
