Sidebar and vertical tabs: release channel experimentation

[asafko]

Hi folks, 

Over the next couple of months, we will be testing an updated sidebar, its tools, and vertical tabs in the release version of Firefox (remember, a while back, we asked you to try it out in Nightly 131, and we appreciated your feedback and encouragement in this Connect thread). If you are using the release version, you might get early access to these features and get a nudge to try them out.

Only a portion of users in Firefox releases 133 and 134 will see this experience, helping us evaluate and improve the features. If you’re part of the experiment, we’d love for you to try this early version and share your thoughts. 

We’re also working on many improvements you’ve requested, including: 

• Easier ways to close tabs in the collapsed sidebar.
• Expanding the sidebar on hover.
• Reducing space used by tools in the expanded sidebar.
• Visually and functionally polishing the sidebar tools panels and browser layout in the vertical tabs mode. 

As usual, we appreciate your patience as we iron out the rough spots in the experience. If you’re not ready to engage with these new features, you can disable them in the sidebar settings or opt out from the experiment via about:studies.

If you are are having trouble figuring out how to disable the sidebar, please follow these steps:

1. Locate the gear icon with the Customize sidebar label at the bottom of the sidebar and click on it.

2. Set the Sidebar button setting to Show and hide sidebar.

3. Click the sidebar button in the toolbar to hide the sidebar (it is highlighted in the second screenshot).

4. Right-click the sidebar icon and choose the Remove from toolbar option.

Set Sidebar button setting to "Show and hide sidebar"Click the sidebar button in the toolbar to hide the sidebarRight click the sidebar icon choose "Remove from toolbar" option.

If you have already removed the sidebar button from the toolbar and are stuck with the sidebar visible, but no toolbar button to close it:

1. Right-click the toolbar and choose the Customize toolbar option.

2. Drag the sidebar icon back to the toolbar and click Done in the lower right corner.

3. Once the sidebar button is back in your toolbar, click it to close the sidebar.

4. Right-click the sidebar icon and choose the Remove from toolbar option.

Sidebar expanded with no sidebar button visibleReturn the sidebar button via Customize toolbarClose the sidebar, right-click the sidebar button and remove it.

 

[barsupi]

so I was forced to activate this since the 133.0 update completely borked the sidebery panel

while I appreciate the effort it works like ass.

- browser lags and slow beyond belief. sidebery could handle my 500+ tabs no issue
- no expand on hover (yet)
- lots of wasted space on padding/ceiling as always
- window minimum width is higher on vertical tab mode. really annoying when I just want to keep a chat or youtube music open.
- click on active tab should have a behavior like going to previous tab.
- you guys have no idea how much I despise round borders and wasted space on the UI. bring the tiniest smallest density back. god i'm so fng mad.

[jscher2000]

Hi barsupi, how did the redesign bork the Sidebery panel?

While those bugs are worked out, you can roll back to the old Sidebar design using the preference mentioned in recent comments:

(A) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button accepting the risk.

More info on about:config: Configuration Editor for Firefox. Please keep in mind that changes made through this back door aren't fully supported and aren't guaranteed to continue working in the future.

(B) In the search box in the page, type or paste sidebar.revamp and pause while the list is filtered

(C) Double-click the preference (or click the toggle button near the end of the row) to switch the value from true to false

[barsupi]

thanks for responding. I ended up disabling all the new revamp and vertical thing after finding a solution.  before that I wasn't able to see or select a thing. the problem with sidebery is due changes in the z-index order and how the sidepanel works.

added :

#main-sidebar-container {
...
z-index: 1001;
}

to the userchrome file and most of the issues are gone.

still the lagging is atrocious in my end. the new vertical tab panel lags my entire system. sidebery or things like "list all tabs" or "show tab list" menus have no issue showing tons of tabs. not always people need to see an image peek of tab or have the hover floating title. I wish those thing could be disabled.

I checked the minimum windows width in vertical tab mode and it becomes something like 700px.  really annoying due that I set a lot of things around 300px or 400px.

having activate horizontal tabs just to keep and small window open is not fun.  

[Fr4kTh1s]

Hello, first comment, but it is positive one.

I love the vertical tabs in sidebar and tab grouping(finally!). It makes work/browsing very practical and helps me cluttering my tab list. Horizontal tabs are no go once you get over 20... With 60+ it is not viable... Horizontal and grouped tabs is the only way...

Few things I have noticed I am missing to make it perfect IMHO:
1. Adjustable width of the sidebar - slide it from just web icons to X pixel width
2. Add more contrast- or option to adjust- to the active tab. It might be issue with theme in OS(Breeze dark - Deb 12), but it is sometimes hard to figure out which tab is really active one when you have multiple of the same web open
3. Positioning of the tab groups isn't possible. Individual tabs can be dragged in the list anywhere, moved to top, bottom, whatever. But once the tab group is created, it's position in the list is fixed. So unless you create it in the exact position where you want it, it will remain there. Or you have to select all tabs above/below it and drag them around the tab group to reposition it.
4. Additional color options/custom color for the group badge

Bug(?) I am right now encountering is not being able to collapse the tab group. On click the bar next to it disappears, if active tab was from tab group being collapsed switches to the first one below the "collapsed" tab group, but the group in the list doesn't collapse like folder would(similar like Brave tab groups do for example).
I am not sure if that is intentional or bug. But it would be nice to have them collapse when you do not need to see them.

After all, thank you very much, it is very appreciated addition 🙂

Firefox Version 133.0 (64-bit)
Operating System: Debian GNU/Linux 12
KDE Plasma Version: 5.27.5
KDE Frameworks Version: 5.103.0
Qt Version: 5.15.8
Kernel Version: 6.12.1 (64-bit)
Graphics Platform: Wayland
System Version: 1.0

[tork90]

There better be an option to disable/hide it, because I'd personally consider hopping browsers if otherwise. It's enough of an eyesore to where I'd explore other options/browsers.

[Blehh_Mae]

I see no purpose for this feature, its just a jarring collection of pointless buttons on the side that takes up space on all websites, why not just put whatever buttons it adds into the regular taskbar customization section, and have the sidebar disabled by default, its just a waste of space and an eyesore and i cant believe the given instructions to remove it dont even work and i had to go into about:config to toggle sidebar.revamp off

[thenoname]

is there a way to hide/remove this sidebar?

[kronapence]

The only way I've found is through about:config and setting sidebar.revamp to false.

[atgyuric]

God this thing is **bleep**ing annoying I did not ask for it...........

[DarphBobo]

Remove the damned thing.

[Frito_Laies]

I dont like it, I don't want it, how do I turn it off? make it go away

[firefoxfixurshi]

absolute ass. please get rid of it.  remove from toolbar does NOTHING.

[Feldherren]

I only ever have the sidebar open as one thing (vertical tabs extension, which works better than the new sidebar functionality as it shows tabs in collapsible groups - replicate that and I'll switch - but is otherwise similar), and don't need the sidebar buttons, but the sidebar is now intrinsically linked to having any sidebar extension open; unless I disable the new sidebar functionality entirely, I'm stuck with it being present and taking up space onscreen.

Please let us close it entirely but still have sidebar extensions open, without disabling the new sidebar revamp.

[asafko]

Can I please ask you if your use case will be covered if:

- sidebar was not visible by default,

- clicking the sidebar button opened your extension panel by default, like in the attached screenshot?

[Fleuria]

As someone with the same use case, this would be good if the side toolbar was hidden, so that the sidebar has nothing but the extension panel. This behaviour actually existed in previous versions of Firefox – in Firefox 132, turning on sidebar.revamp, hiding the sidebar and then toggling Sidebery would result in the new sidebar design containing only Sidebery, without Firefox’s toolbar to the side. The toolbar being hidden hides Firefox’s vertical tabs as well, if enabled; this behaviour lets me use Sidebery as my only tab interface, which is what I prefer.

The attached screenshot shows what this looked like in Firefox 132. The steps taken are:

1. In ‘Customize Firefox’, enable native title bars
2. Turn on sidebar.revamp in about:config
3. In ‘Customize Sidebar’, enable vertical tabs and set the sidebar to ‘show and hide’
4. Install Sidebery
5. Press the sidebar button to hide the sidebar
6. Press the Sidebery button to show only the Sidebery panel

[Kazemyers]

I'm really liking the sidebar! It saves screen realstate which is something very important to me. The only thing i'm finding very cumbersome to use so far is that when you collapse to icons (as shown in the image below) there could be a little close button on the icon when the mouse hovers over it, so i don't have to open the sidebar every time i want to close a tab,or right click close or use alt+w.

[asafko]

Thank you for your feedback, @Kazemyers. We're working on adding the close button in the collapsed state.

[ThePillenwerfer]

I don't like it and have no use for it; it simply duplicates existing ways of doing things, most of which I don't do anyway.

However, to offer some constructive criticism, in a collapsed state it seems much wider then it needs to be.  When the History Sidebar is opened it is slightly wider than the old version but contains less information down to large internal margins so tightening these up would be an improvement.

  

Such things are down to personal taste but I'd prefer the collapsed bar to to be coloured with --lwt-accent-color rather than --toolbar-bgcolor.

[stupidus]

Remove that 'feature'.

[kronapence]

I hate the sidebar.  It should've been offered to me, but not forced on me.  I wasted too much time trying to figure out how to close it.  The only solution was to change it in about:config, which I shouldn't have had to do.  Please, if you are moving forward with this, make it easy to close and/or remove.  Thank you.

[BWBODDY]

didn't help, I didn't see anything about removing the sidebar.

The "Customize sidebar" (with the gear icon) is still at the bottom and shifting everything off to screen left

This is just taking up space on the side on my screen.

IT IS DRIVING ME NUTS

[ThePillenwerfer]

The way via the Gear icon is the official one but a lot of people are having trouble with it.  Here's an alternative method:—

Type about:config into the search/URL bar.

That will bring up a warning which you'll have to acknowledge.

On the next screen there's a search box at the top. Type or paste sidebar.revamp into it. That will then appear below with the word true next to it. Double-click true and it will change to false.

We have been warned that this is only temporary but hopefully an official Off switch will be provided.  If one isn't it'll need resource to Custom CSS.

[BWBODDY]

THAT DID IT!

Thank you so much, that WAS driving me INSANE!

[internalserver]

Please God get rid of this. This was 100% a terrible idea. Im not trying to be rude, Im really not. But as a web developer it gets in the way. Even trying to close it does not work.

[jscher2000]

I know with a thread this long people can't find all the "how to" replies, but if you are trying to close the sidebar in a way that hides the vertical button bar, the setting is here:

Unfortunately, there is currently no way to close the sidebar without using the button. Hopefully a keyboard shortcut, or a close button on the vertical button bar, will be added so the extra toolbar button isn't needed.

[internalserver]

Yeah I did that and there was no side bar button when show/hide was selected. And nobody on any of the reddit complaints from the last few days was able to show where it was either and kept getting annoyed that people couldnt find it.

about:config was the only way I could get it to work. It's a bad idea. If this MUST be implemented, it should be a nice little tick box in the preferences. I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out how to get around it without the about:config and finally just did it. I prefer to keep my extensions where they usually are - the top right tucked above the bookmarks folder. No need to change it.

[jscher2000]

---

@internalserver wrote:

Yeah I did that and there was no side bar button when show/hide was selected.

---

When I toggle sidebar.revamp to true, the Sidebars button appears at the left end of the toolbar. Not sure why that didn't happen for you, but obviously that needs to be fixed. If you do need to add it yourself, you can (Customize Firefox controls, buttons and toolbars), but this assumes you know that you need it.

---

If this MUST be implemented, it should be a nice little tick box in the preferences.

---

Maybe there, and maybe the right-click context menu where you turn other bars (Menu bar, Bookmarks toolbar) on and off.

---

I prefer to keep my extensions where they usually are - the top right tucked above the bookmarks folder. No need to change it.

---

Which extensions were using the vertical button bar? I would think only the ones that put a page or other content in the sidebar would place their button there. (I don't think I have any extensions like that at this time.)

[Gouambas]

So after following all four steps and opting out of this experiment via "about:studies" the sidebar remains in the window, just in its collapsed state. Are there any other methods I could use to get rid of it permanently? Or do I actually just have to get used to having less screen real estate to work with?

[Gouambas]

So after following all four steps and opting out of this experiment via "about:studies" the sidebar remains in the window, just in its collapsed state. Are there any other methods I could use to get rid of it permanently? Or do I actually just have to get used to having less screen real estate to work with?

Note: I am a computer novice so if there is an actual coding thing I can do I have not done so.

[jscher2000]

If you did both of the setup steps -- changing the toolbar button to show/hide and making sure the toolbar button is available -- then clicking the toolbar button should hide the sidebar.

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/discussions/sidebar-and-vertical-tabs-release-channel-experimentation...

[Tawn]

This new sidebar doesn't work with all (AMO) themes. I had Black Abyss theme enabled and with the sidebar turned on (but vertical tabs off) the sidebar appears to be completely blank. Hovering over it just shows an arrow cursor. If you hover long enough in the correct area, "customize sidebar" appears in a tooltip and if you click that area the customize panel appears. I'm running Nightly, but release channel users need a simple method to enable/disable this.

[JustRTFM]

No duh. Themes need to be updated to theme the new sidebar.

[wealstarr]

Hello everyone,

I've waited so long for Firefox to implement the vertical tabs but apparently we're still away from making it a functional feature without bugs. It breaks my heart that I still can't use it.

I tested Firefox 133 on Windows 10 vertical tabs and found some issues that I shell list chronologically.

1. In the always collapsed state, there's no close button on the tabs. I don't have a mouse to utilize the mouse buttons to close the tabs. I'm using Zen browser which has this functionality. It adds a close button on the tab icons in vertical bar which shows upon hovering. No need to right click, left click or any other hassle. Clean and tidy. Here's a screenshot from the Zen browser:

2. There's an usual visual artifact on the sidebar. Even when there's no scrollbar, the scrollbar track is always visible. Screenshot below from version 133

3. There's no indication of the current active tab in the vertical tab. Like a highlight color or outline color or anything of that sorts. It's impossible to tell active tab from the inactive tabs. Zen browser also does this exceptionally well. Below screenshot from Zen browser

Notice the pink margin on the left hand highlighting the active tab. Color doesn't necessarily have to be pink. Any subtle minimal color should do.

4. Audio playing tabs. There's no way to highlight the tab currently playing the audio. Sideberry has this function. I think it's called assign color to active tabs or something like that. It would super helpful to have that.

4.1 A simple function to mute the audio playing tab like doable click on the tab.

These functions are all essential in making the vertical tab experience seamless integration. Like you expect from a "native" function right out of the box from Mozilla.

I don't know how much Mozilla listens to the users, this is first time posting here. But without the suggestions made above, vertical tabs can't be used.

Kind regards

[wealstarr]

I would like to add a couple of things I missed earlier.

1. It's proposed to expand the vertical tab bar on hover. That clicks with many users but many of us like to keep tab bar collapsed on all time, hovering or otherwise. Please also give options to keep it always collapsed, if possible.

2. Somebody mentioned about updating themes, I would like to second this request. The themes usually meant for horizontal tab bar, looks weird on vertical tab bar. It's my opinion for whatever it's worth, that if the color of the titlebar (rebar?) the one that has all the buttons as well as URL bar, is the same as the color of the side bar.

Kind regards

[ThreeFatSamurai]

I hate it. Please give us the option to remove it completely. It's so annoying for me.

[Rakeh]

So how exactly do I remove the sidebar? The instruction on the top are BARELY comprehensible to me despite having two doctorates and they are written in a way that gets me stuck in a endless loop of 1-2-3-4. As far as I can tell, there is no way to remove the sidebar using these steps, or at least am I not seeing any option to do so whatsoever. There's even an instruction at the end of the first post to repeat steps 1-2 after steps 3-4, hence completing the endless loop. What am I missing? What are all the people here and on reddit missing? Note that my criticism is focused solely on the utterly incomprehensible, cyclical, and ultimately useless sidebar removal instructions on the top. I fully acknowledge this new feature might be useful for some people. Thank you!

Seriously, at this point, I am thinking the top post must be a joke. Some kind of April's fool prank in November.

[araujoms]

I only have one doctorate, but those instructions were also useless for me. The way to remove it is go to about:config and set sidebar.revamp to false.

[wutongtaiwan]

我想要一个功能将 identity 选项卡固定到侧边栏。我在打开网站时使用“Private”身份选项卡，我希望能够更快地访问此选项卡，因此我需要此功能

[wutongtaiwan]

I want a feature to pin the identity tab to the sidebar. I use the "Private" identity tab when I open a website, and I want to be able to access this tab more quickly, so I need this feature

[nixiemc]

I am the same person as "nixieff," who appears very rarely on Mozilla Support's community forums. I was one of a lucky few users to be on-boarded onto the new sidebar via Firefox 133. I have two questions at this time (perhaps I will have more later; we'll see where we go from here).

1. When viewing your history in the old sidebar, you have options to organise your history by date, site, date and site, most visited, and last visited. However, when viewing your history in the new sidebar, you are only able to organise your history by date and site. Why is this the case? (I have a conflict of interest because I've organised my history by last visited for around a decade and am disappointed to see this option be removed with the new update.)

2. I believe that the sidebar has been introduced to facilitate the new AI Chatbot tool (because the Firefox Support page about the sidebar - https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/use-firefox-sidebar-access-bookmarks-history-synced - now tells people to go to an article entitled "Enable AI chatbots in Firefox" to learn more about the new sidebar). However, this implies completely redesigning the sidebar to make way for a single button. Is there any reason why AI Chatbots cannot instead be accessed from the toolbar at the top of the screen? (It could drop down from the toolbar onto the page, like clicking the Pocket or Library buttons do.)