[Konversation-devel] Konversation Change

[Eike Hein]

Sacha wrote:
> Hi,
> I heard you are the konversation maintainer and was curious as to the
> reasoning behind the change in how tabs are displayed in a recent
> konversation update. In previous versions, tabs were shown on the left
> hand side with indentation for channels. Currently, tabs are shown
> underneath with no indication of where the servers are and which
> channels are in them.

The default in Konversation has always been to display tabs
at the bottom of the window, with the left-hand display pro-
vided as an option beginning with version 1.0. I'm assuming
you're a user of the "Kubuntu" distribution which had devia-
ted from our default and set the position to left-hand,
which was recently reverted.

The two primary reasons for the bottom default setting are
as follows:

- Tab bars are the more prevalent interface element for app-
  lications of this nature throughout KDE, such as Kopete
  and Konsole. Konversation's overarching mission in life
  is to be a great fit in a KDE environment, and as such we
  like that consistency of appearance and handling.

- The left-hand alternative was primarily added for users
  who run into the space constraints of the bottom tab bar
  due to having many channels open. For a scenario with
  only a few channels, on the other hand, it's a poor use
  of space. Now, someone who is in a lot of channels tends
  to be a heavy and experienced user of IRC, and as such,
  will likely be interested in customizing their client to
  a greater extent than someone who is new to IRC and only
  uses a few channels. Hence the default setting gears to-
  ward the newbie rather than the veteran: The veteran can
  switch the position if he needs to.


I'm happy you like the left-hand view (I wrote it) -- you
can switch to it in the Interface -> Tabs section of the
Konversation preferences dialog.



> Thanks,
>  - Sacha

-- 
Regards,
Eike Hein, hein at kde.org