[Evolution-hackers] hiding the sidebar

[William Jon McCann <mccannwj pha jhu edu>]

Hello,

I've been fiddling with ways to hide the sidebar.  I think there are a 
number of good reasons why a user might wish to do this.  Let me know if 
I should make a case...

Currently, the component info widget and component button widgets 
prevent the pane from completely collapsing.

Personally, I disable the component buttons altogether.  I prefer to 
invoke the apps separately (a la 
http://lists.ximian.com/archives/public/evolution-patches/2004-April/005011.html). 
   Since the buttons have other issues like 
http://bugzilla.ximian.com/show_bug.cgi?id=57783, I'll just ignore them 
for now.

The component info widget uses a minimum size based on the size of the 
component icon, the length of the info string, and "..." for the location.

This can be overridden by telling gtk_pane to resize and shrink children 
in e-shell-window.c:setup_widgets().  However, this causes some pretty 
ugly behavior where the info text overlaps the location text and icon.


I see at least a few possibilities:

 * Use a View menu item to show/hide the sidebar.

   PROS:
      - can just do a gtk_widget_{show,hide} on the sidebar widget
      - it is common to locate similar functionality in the view menu

   CONS:
      - requires the user to understand what a sidebar is
      - can be confusing when multiple panes are visible
      - requires adding more configuration (gconf) parameters

 * Set the pane size to zero when the user moves the pane gutter up to 
or past the minimum size of the sidebar.

   PROS:
      - direct user manipulation
      - would use existing functionality to remember size

   CONS:
      - sudden jump may confuse users

 * Change component info widget to allow more shrinking
   Possibly ellipsising the info label.
   Possibly hiding each label widget when only "..." is displayed.

   PROS:
      - might be the most intuitive for users

   CONS:
      - might be difficult to get right?


Any thoughts?

Thanks,
Jon