A proper Split View implementation

land@lemmy.ml to Firefox@lemmy.ml – 36 points –

I know Firefox has a Split View feature; however, it’s not as convenient as Vivaldi or the Arc browser. I love how The browser company implemented the Split View screen. Firefox Split View is pretty limited, and I’m unsure if it has improved since its release.

What does the community think about that?

Here is an example of Arc browser split view:

https://file.coffee/u/Rxk2KyOhOYMDVa2JPY0cE.gif

31

Why not use your window manager / compositor for this feature?

For one thing, you don't have to struggle with a shrunken top toolbar.

There's a good reason a significant and increasing number of browsers (including Floorp, a Firefox fork) and other applications include view-splitting within them.

There's a reason Mozilla made Side View for Firefox.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/side-view/

Yeah, just drag the tab out and create a new window. This post reads more like an ad for the Arc browser and isn't related to Firefox. I don't even know how to create Split View.

I'm using Firefox Nightly along with Arc Browser, and I think there's room for improvement in Firefox. It's just a suggestion, nothing more.

How do I use Split View in Firefox?

There’s an official add-on by Firefox

I have this addon. This is not Split View.

Even Floorp (Firefox fork) has a built-in split view, however it pretty limited. https://file.coffee/u/oEGzVEe8jr2N8Z6gtqL1F.gif

This is just the Firefox addon you have linked previously that is called "Side View". They just changed the limitation of the sideview panel. You can remove the restriction too, but need to edit files and create folder in your Firefox user folder. Obviously this is not something most people do, but I am used to it and edited a lot in the past.

Here is a screenshot where I drag the size of the Side View / Split View to half of window (it can take entire size, normal tab is on the left and side view on the right):

https://superuser.com/questions/1276800/customize-the-maximum-width-of-the-firefox-sidebar

Floorp is just using Side View? I didn't realize.

Wait a minute, I didn't mean it literally just uses the exact same extension. They may even. But I meant functional the same as Side View. Sorry for the confusion, I wasn't clear about that.

I was just curious because I'm pretty sure Sidebery is used in their implementation of a sidebar, in a not-so-under-the-hood way.

That makes sense. I’m using Floorp, which already has many CSS tweaks built-in; however, it is pretty limited, as you saw in the gif. With Arc, you can have as many Split/side Views. It’s one of their main selling features.

I would have a look into it (just out of curiosity, I'm happy with Firefox), but it's proprietary and not open source.

That’s what I was referring to as Firefox “Split View”

For the Split View function, how do you activate it in Firefox? And why not just use a second Firefox window instead splitting a tab? I mean what would improve it if doing the split and what exactly is limited in the Firefox implementation of Split View in your opinion? If you have suggestions to improve, then you need to be more specific.

I kind of feel this way about tabs, but everyone loves tabs so much I'm often too embarrassed to say anything.

Plasma (KDE) and Windows can both stack lots of windows just fine, so, why not let the window manager handle this and keep the browser more focused on browser tasks?

Wait, so instead of using tabs in your browser you just... put separate windows on top of each other, and use your taskbar/keyboard shortcut to switch between them?

My compositor does this for me. Not Firefox.

Yeah literally anyone can do that on any OS. But it’s a lot clunkier than simply showing tabs side by side in the browser itself

I find the browsers’ various implementations to be far inferior to the built in system split screen. They really overwork my already overstimulated ADHD brain.

Not everybody has a compositor that allows you to un-maximize, minimize, restore, move and resize two windows adjacent to each other simultaneously.

Which one supports this on Windows and Linux?

PowerToys has FancyZones for Windows.

It's a valiant effort to allow functionality for window tiling, but like the name suggests it's for arranging things on a screen. It can't really facilitate two windows behalf as if they're one window split in two.

The truth is there is not a tool out there for every use case that gets posted here. You're going to have to weigh your options and pick what works closest to what you need. In my case, opening a new browser window will make my compositor mimic this behavior to an acceptable degree. Also in my case, it will not work on Windows. This is a trade off I am willing to make. It also might not be the best idea to want a feature bloated browser. How many people will use this over PowerTools/their preferred Linux compositor? Probably not many.

Everyone says "do it with your compositor" but I don't think anyone who says that has ever really tried the convenience of split view.

My biggest problem with simply opening two Firefox tabs is that my tabs split, and sure, I can just drag them around, but for me (TWM user) I prefer to be able to do everything from the keyboard, and moving tabs between windows is not something that can be done do with key shortcuts

Unrelated to the OP, but your Unraid docker dashboard seems to be more horizontal than vertical, as in the apps are lining up horizontally. Is this something you did yourself? Don't recall that being an option in Unraid. And am now all too curious about how you achieved it 😅

I think they applied some kind of hack to do it. If you have a look, you can see that half of the columns doesn't actually contain the info that it's supposed to.