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Real talk on tabs -- Tabs were always just a way for the browser to mitigate how horribly window managers handled multiple open windows at the time. IMO the OS/

Real talk on tabs -- Tabs were always just a way for the browser to mitigate how horribly window managers handled multiple open windows at the time. IMO the OS/Distro/WM itself should be managing a global tab interface for all apps to use, rather than having app-makers needlessly reinvent the wheel over-and-over again.

johnchristopher 5y ago
Interesting read: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/meet-the-man-who-invented-tabs https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/meet-th... Tabs didn't appear in Netscape before 2002. I recall reading somewhere on the web that devs from Netscape didn't like the idea but don't quote me on that.
bentcorner 5y ago
It'd be neat to have a "container window" within which you could put arbitrary applications in, and have a tab associated with each of them. So you could group a bunch of open web pages, a word document and a file folder for some research on a particular topic. Or a game and a walkthrough together. Your repl, ide, and a web browser open on stackoverflow for some programming. Instead of application-oriented navigation, you'd have group s of tasks that you'd navigate between. You'd probably ctrl-tab between tabs inside of a container more often than you'd alt-tab between tasks.
- calvinmorrison 5y ago
  see: tabbed (suckless.org) XEmbed i3
  - LargoLasskhyfv 5y ago
    Or Fluxbox
- kemitche 5y ago
  You can do this, at least with Windows or Linux, by grouping windows into separate desktops.
wtallis 5y ago
I agree that tabs initially addressed the problem of bad window managers. But nowadays I use Tree Style Tab which incorporates hierarchy and the context of related tabs in a way that I don't think an external window manager could handle anywhere near as well.
Fr0styMatt88 5y ago
Stardock actually has software for Windows that does something like that: https://www.stardock.com/products/groupy/ https://www.stardock.com/products/groupy/
galkk 5y ago
I agree with that. As soon as I switched to i3 on linux, I stopped using any tabs/windows splits in Terminator (my terminal emulator of choice at a time). I still use tmux on remote ssh, but locally i3 does much better deal than terminator/kitty/you name it

johnchristopher 5y ago

Interesting read: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/meet-the-man-who-invented-tabs https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/meet-th... Tabs didn't appear in Netscape before 2002. I recall reading somewhere on the web that devs from Netscape didn't like the idea but don't quote me on that.

bentcorner 5y ago

It'd be neat to have a "container window" within which you could put arbitrary applications in, and have a tab associated with each of them. So you could group a bunch of open web pages, a word document and a file folder for some research on a particular topic. Or a game and a walkthrough together. Your repl, ide, and a web browser open on stackoverflow for some programming. Instead of application-oriented navigation, you'd have group s of tasks that you'd navigate between. You'd probably ctrl-tab between tabs inside of a container more often than you'd alt-tab between tasks.

calvinmorrison 5y ago
see: tabbed (suckless.org) XEmbed i3
- LargoLasskhyfv 5y ago
  Or Fluxbox
kemitche 5y ago
You can do this, at least with Windows or Linux, by grouping windows into separate desktops.

wtallis 5y ago

I agree that tabs initially addressed the problem of bad window managers. But nowadays I use Tree Style Tab which incorporates hierarchy and the context of related tabs in a way that I don't think an external window manager could handle anywhere near as well.

Fr0styMatt88 5y ago

Stardock actually has software for Windows that does something like that: https://www.stardock.com/products/groupy/ https://www.stardock.com/products/groupy/

galkk 5y ago

I agree with that. As soon as I switched to i3 on linux, I stopped using any tabs/windows splits in Terminator (my terminal emulator of choice at a time). I still use tmux on remote ssh, but locally i3 does much better deal than terminator/kitty/you name it