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I think it would be good to have an option that either puts x buttons on each tab in the editor or puts one (a little bit bigger) x button next to tab navigation buttons that closes the active tab. (like in Firefox) I work in linux and it's hard for me to "shoot" the x button on the tab whenever I intend to close it. The big x button would ease my life a bit.
It would make my life easier too
Also would improve horizontal screen usage for small displays a little.
I agree with this. I find the file close icon far too small. Why make it smaller than the project close icon? Files are after all closed much more often than projects...
Agreed, we should do this. I have another use case - when closing multiple documents, but not all, it's much easier to just click on one place repeadetly then to "hunt" small x buttons on each tab, which are moving. Uppering the priority.
This is te right way, I think. It works for Firefox, so I think it can for us as well.
Is there any plan to implement this for 5.1?
Yes, we are thinking about this for next release. However it still depends on prioritization and resources, so we're not sure yet.
I think this is not as non-controversial as it looks. Google has done an usability test of the tabbed browsing in Firefox, part of which was studying the usability of the close tab buttons: http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/ben/archives/009210.html There are some nice pros and cons at http://www.mikegoodspeed.com/blog/archives/2005/11/03/ui-review-on-firefox-tabs/ See also the Firefox 2 PRD: http://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox2/PRD There is a "improve discoverability and usability of close tab button" P1 item. Not clear what it exactly means, but if they put a close button on each tab in Firefox 2 and we remove the close tab buttons in 6.0 saying "it works for Firefox, it must work for us too", we will look funny.
This is probably a matter of taste. I like having the close button on every tab and I do miss it in Firefox. When I think about it, I do not use the one big close button in Firefox at all, I either use a key shortcut or the tab pop-up menu. I hope that if this enhancement will be implemented it will be optional and I will be still able to use the old good button per tab style.
I personally think that there shoul dbe support for both types of close . I dont see why it shoul dbe considered as a choice. If there are options for this then individual, single or both Just my 2c
Please note that the Firefox extension "Tab Mix Plus" has an option to put close buttons on individual tabs (which I use, FWIW). In fact that extension has about every imaginable option, so if you really want to experiment with the effects of different policies, just install that extension and play.
Sometimes, when I used the FireFox I close a tab which I don't want to close. This is reason why I used the extension, which Jesse mentioned. On the other hand I think that both approach can be in NetBeans just like if you have FireFox with the Tab Mix Plus extension.
Close ALL tabs button Dear colleagues I studied the problem of the close all tabs button and unfortunately - I have to refuse this issue. I'm actually feeling that to have just one close button for all tabs has smaller priority like to have close button for each tab. I believe that you see some examples, when the close all button is useful. Therefore - if you are studying this problem you are able to find a lot of UseCases which are able to tell you that to have only one close button is "flow" problem (for example, if the user wants to close tab I, tab III, tab V, tab VII etc. shortly if he needs to read the source and after that close the tab). We have to prioritize just one UseCase - main UseCase. And this main UseCase is " the user wants to read source and after that he wants to close source (he/she needs to press on tabs if he/ she wants to select other source file. If he/she wants to select other source file and wants to close particular file, he/she wants to move the mouse cursor minimaly. And the all close button is not able to provide it). We can this issue realize on the "Options level". Because this issue is on the "options level" we should focus our force for studying other "more important things" than this. Thanks for your help,energy and enthusiasm for NetBenas IDE. Stay in the touche Josef Pavlicek Human interface designer
asd abadea said, (and saubrecht pointed me to http://mozillalinks.blogspot.com/) new version of firefox will use close buttons on every tab, with automatic hiding of close tabs for not active tabs when there is not enough space. I think we should follow their idea, so my suggestion is: 1) Make the close button for editor tabs bigger (so that it's easier to hit it with mouse) 2) Hide the close button for all non-active ("background") tabs when there is not enough space = when tabs start to scroll. josefpavlicek and others, how does this sound?
Hi Dsimonek,it's make sense. To follow the Firefox idea makes sense for me. Now I see only one problem. If the close button is visible only by the active tab (it is good idea), how I can close second - not active tab? Now, if you have installed the tabs plug-in in the FireFox, you can close each not active tabs. If you move the pointer of mouse over the tab, the close button changes his color from gray to red and it is active. The question is how it works if the close button is not visible. Can you close the not active tab if you move your mouse pointer over the tab ? The not visible close button will be visible and will be working? If yes, it is good idea, it makes sense and I think, it will be good to implement it into NetBeans IDE. Josef P
Oracle SQL Developer hides close buttons unless you mouseover on the tab. I think it's a good idea if it's going to be implemented in this way. I still prefer the one big button and don't think it's a good idea to take patterns from Firefox directly.
Hi, I'm very enjoy to listen your opinion. I believe that for you is better to have only one big close button on the right side of NetBenas IDE. As I wrote a few notes up, we have a lot of reasons why we will not implement this request. The idea of “Firefox” - show big close button only on the active tab and if I move the pointer of mouse over the not active tab, the system shows close button in the not active tab – I see very useful for our users now. Thanks for your help Josef P
josefp: No, you can't close the tab with mouse when close button is not visible. Just the keyboard shortcut. The idea of having close button visible only on active tab is because it saves the space and UI is less cluttered. Visible close button on mouseover is good idea, I supported it long time ago, however then space saving is lost....but perhaps no, here is new complete suggestion: 1) Make the close button for editor tabs bigger (so that it's easier to hit it with mouse) 2) Hide the close button for all non-active ("background") tabs by default. 3) Show close button for non-active tab only on mouse-over. Space is *not* reserved for close button in this situation, so close button will cover end part of the text displayed in the tab. That way we have nearly all - bigger x, ability to close every tab with the mouse, less visual clutter and also horizontal space saved. vanob: Both Firefox usability study and our HIEs prefer close buttons directly on tabs, so we're probably not going to implement one close button on the side, I'm sorry.
Since my first comment on this some while back I've had time to think about the real reason why I wanted this. My typical usage is as follows: I have a number of projects open. A range of files for these projects get opened over a period of time. As each file seems useful to go back to for a variety of reasons I often leave them open (e.g. someone is checking if I have fixed a problem and may come back soon, or it may be a file that I keep going back to now and again). Over time I end up with a large number of files that are open and realise that having a smaller number of files open that relate directly to what I am currently doing would be more productive so now I want to tidy up unwanted files.... I tentatively propose having a right-click on the cross opening a menu for closing files (or some other gesture). The menu could then offer the following * Close this file * Close other files * Close files from this project * Close files from other projects * Close files from this package * Close files from other packages This could possibly be supplemented by adding the capability of hiding files so that they disappear from the editor file bar but still appear when the file drop-down icon on the far right is clicked. Or maybe there could be a virtual favourites folder for each project as a means of avoiding any lengthy project navigation.
Hi Dsimonek, I have to support the functionality which doesn't brake the user “flow” (please, think work flow). So, if the user wants to close non-active tab, he wants to move his/her pointer of mouse over the tab. Now he/she wants to close the tab. He/she wants to close this tab just for ONE click. One click is more important than place in the tab. Now I am downloading the Oracle SQL Developer like vanob suggests. I will test how it looks if the close button is not visible by default and it is turning up by mouse-over. I think that your ideas (point 1,2,3) sounds very clever. So, give me a few days for thinking about that subject please. Thanks for your help Josef
+1
>>1) Make the close button for editor tabs bigger (so that it's easier to hit it >>with mouse) >>2) Hide the close button for all non-active ("background") tabs by default. >>3) Show close button for non-active tab only on mouse-over. Space is *not* >>reserved for close button in this situation, so close button will cover end part >>of the text displayed in the tab. this preferred and hope will available in 6.5
*** Issue 42510 has been marked as a duplicate of this issue. ***
I have a suggestion that I think would serve all: use tabs always with the same width. That way, when you close a tab the next one will appear exactly where the closed one was, and the close button will also be in exactly the same place and all close buttons will be in predictable places avoiding the annoying "hunt". This way, to close a succession of tabs you just point to the first and click several times in the same place.
ngbrito's suggestion would unfortunately waste horizontal real estate in case some files with very short names were opened simultaneously with some files with very long names, which is common enough.
You could limit the width of the tabs to a reasonable size and truncate the long filenames (e.g. "AVeryLongFilen..."). If you really need to see the entire name then the tooltip showing the path should be enough. Or it could be configurable: user who value more the horizontal real estate could use variable size tabs (these people might also be interested in limiting the tab width and truncating long names) and those who don't like to hunt small targets can use the predictable constant width tabs.