[paintbox]

I understand that search bar position is not changeable by theming, it's a Thunderbird team's decision, but it irks me to see it take up so much premium space. It was the same with browsers, it took many years and iterations to get where we are now (tabs on top, no wasted space) and I think those lessons should be carried over.

[diggan]

> where we are now (tabs on top, no wasted space)

Tabs at the top is wasted space, I much prefer my tabs on the side instead, as most web content is taller than it is wide, and I have a widescreen monitor. I understand the choice of tabs on top when 640x480 was the most common resolution, but for desktop usage today? Tabs on top seems like an outdated layout choice.

[JohnFen]

Options are good. I hate having tabs or other controls vertically on the side. I like them at the top. There's no reason we can't both be happy.

[danbruc]

There are browser - Vivaldi for example - that allow you to place the tab strip on any edge you want. To me personally it just looks and feels wrong, maybe just because of years of exposure to tabs on the top, but I can not get used to it, even though I have to admit that the tab labels are much nicer to read on the left if you have sufficiently many tabs open.

[eumenides1]

Tree Style Tabs! Tree Style Tabs! Tree Style Tabs!

[zamadatix]

I've always been sad "tabs + browser bar + title bar" (i.e. in a single row) at the top never seems to stick around as an option. On larger monitors this results in a near perfect utilization of space while still being able to have reasonably wide tab titles.

Vivaldi & Floorp offer this through being highly customizable but they tend to have cracks around the edges of their use for the same reason.

I was first introduced to this with a Chrome flag back in 2011 https://www.askvg.com/how-to-enable-new-compact-navigation-f... but they ended up backing out for various reasons (the largest of which was probably the specific design used a pop-down url bar which went over the page area, so could be spoofed).

In 2021 Safari became the largest browser I've seen roll this out as a 1st party feature to general users, but it faced some backlash https://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-get-more-space-in-safar... I'm not a big fan of their particular styling choices but the layout was pretty decent.

[perching_aix]

This is a popular argument, just one small problem with it: the 4:3 displays of old (640×480 et al) were also "wide" rather than "tall". So by this logic, there would have never been a time where horizontal tabs (or indeed, a horizontal taskbar) would have "made sense".

So I think it's reasonably easy to see that this is not and was never the actual driver behind this decision. It's completely retconned.

[ordinarily]

Horizontal space is still a premium regardless of monitor size when designing/building for responsive viewports. Vertical space is almost zero cost in terms of design constraints.

Even on large monitors you'd be surprised the number of people at 150% zoom with small windows opened instead of fullscreen.

[braiamp]

Since nobody mentioned, Firefox and I think Chrome has vertical tabs, Firefox is just released https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/140.0/releasenotes/

[criley2]

Having a widescreen monitor is irrelevant to me unless I fullscreen my browser (which I don't and I assume most don't). My (multiple) browser windows on my very big wide screen are all roughly in 4:3 ~square shape and top tabs make a lot more sense.

And unless you have a browser full of tabs, vertical tab lists usually have massive amounts of purely wasted white space and are generally much less space efficient overall.

Every once in a while I wouldn't mind for a specific window to have vertical tabs with nested tabs, as a psuedo live-bookmark organization system for a current project. But it's not a daily driver for me.

[berkes]

Putting often used controls (tabs, docs, menus, etc) across the long side has a solid argument going for it too, though: your mouse pointer is almost always closer to one of the long sides.

Also, if vertical screen estate is a concern, just turn your monitor 90° A lot of professionals working with paper sized documents (legal, bookkeeping, administration) do this.

As a software engineer, I've tried it, but I prefer splitting windows (tiling, or panes or such) horizontally. So my estate is limited in width more than in height.

[globular-toast]

Tabs visible at all is wasted space. I only need to see the options when I'm actively trying to change tab. I don't need to see them on the screen at all times.

This is one of the things I love about my Emacs config. I just hit a key to get things like buffers or file trees up when I need them, then they disappear.

I'd love to have a keyboard driven browser but whenever I've tried I always end up with one hand on the mouse anyway so it doesn't work.

[stronglikedan]

> Tabs at the top is wasted space

Not if your screen is in portrait orientation.

But that wasn't the point of the person you are responding to anyway. The point is all the empty wasted space that was above the tabs before it was removed and the tabs moved to the top.

[ShadowBanThis03]

Not if you're using side-by-side windows.

[chartered_stack]

The Thunderbird search bar really sucks. Advanced search with the actual functionality is hidden away behind some weird menu while the big honking bar at the top of each page does basic text search and offers nothing more.

[laxd]

The search bar does filtering in the current folder. Fast, simple, and what I most commonly want.

[BobbyTables2]

Indeed. Take a look at late 1990s software, even things with complex toolbars (Word, Corel Draw, etc).

At 640x480 resolution, the toolbar was tiny but powerful.

Now at 1920x1080 resolution the toolbar is relatively huge and dumbed down.

All the benefits of higher resolutions and larger monitors have been lost on stupid UI trends.

[Calzifer]

> I understand that search bar position is not changeable by theming,

It is changeable. With enough dedication you can go a long way just with CSS.

In this case it is even rather easy because the "unified toolbar" the thing containing the search box, the menu bar (if shown) and the tab bar are three elements in the same flex box. They can be reordered by setting the order property.

Only downside in this case is that (if client side decoration is not disabled in the settings) the window buttons (close, minimize) are also part of the unified toolbar and would end (without further fixes) below the tab bar.

As a quick (and dirty) experiment I moved the tab bar left to the search bar in the same row just with:

  #titlebar {
    flex-direction: row;
    > unified-toolbar { order: 2; width: 50vw; }
    #tabs-toolbar { order: 1; width: 50vw; }
  }

And a hacky way which often works good enough is to reposition and hardcode stuff with position:absolute/fixed/sticky.

Finally Thunderbird's own customization dialog can be used to fill the empty space around the search bar. By default it has a spacer left and right but that is easy to change even without custom CSS.

[hulitu]

> tabs on top, no wasted space) and I think those lessons should be carried over.

hell no. I want the title bar, the scrollbars and the window border back. I work with more than one window.

[eviks]

How do scroll bars help manage multiple windows?

[dazzawazza]

I agree with you but it irks me more that the search doesn't find the content I'm looking for. Apple Mail search feels much more useful.

[hshdhdhj4444]

Quick filters have almost completely replaced search for me.

While that does speak to the strength of TB’s Quick filters it’s also an indictment of its search

[runxel]

That we can search at all is nearly a miracle given the old and bad infra. At least they work hard (I hope) on replacing the old system with a real database. That should enable the conversation view (Gmail-like), too!

[eviks]

There is plenty wasted space in browser tabs, from close buttons to padding to rounded/non-rect corners