Removing the sidebar?

acctman

Is there a how-to for removing the side bar? Maybe having everything for the sidebar load under a tab or linked page?

jimw

I've been working on a new theme that will have the sidebar removed and puts it in a hidden panel. If you like, I can dig up what I did and put together some documentation.

jakob_r

The problem with other tabs or pages is that the sidebar is mostly contextual and relates to the currently loaded page, so putting it out to another tab or page makes little sense. A long while ago I too tried putting the sidebar in a horizontal hideable panel that disappeared behind the menu items but came to the conclusion that a panel that disappear on the side or drops down as a long menu will probably work better than a horizontal menu, because you have to declutter it a lot to make it usable and that means editing the menu text and the panel insertion positions for lots of plug-ins you use. Having said that, it's not that hard to do with your own theme and style files (see vanilla documentation). The #Panel div follows the menu, you need to take out the start button and put it in a div of its own, and you need to add a button that does the hide/show (vanilla already has a hide/show script integrated for the big/small input textarea).

Wanderer

I agree jacob_r, the sidebar is not a "dumb" part of the page, at least it shouldn't be.
It contains pertinent information, as you say, in "smart" context with the current page.
Often it pushes pertinent information to the viewer which would not necessarily be seen if it was hidden in a tab.
The sidebar is everyone's friend, as long as it is relevant and tastefully presented and not full of useless clutter.

Having said that, an option to "hide" it would be useful to some. Like many of the applications I use, all of the palettes may be put away but there's a few that I always keep open because of the information they provide.

jimw

The Hidepanel add-on works very well.