Has anyone come across any online content that jumps outside the box and re-thinks how we can organize multi-windowed content more effectively than using the classic tab bar along the top of the window?
I'm building a Cocoa application that could potentially have a lot of "tabs" open at any given time and I've always found tab bar to get a bit cluttered in these cases.
An example of an alternative would be a multi-column format, where the "tabs" are actually stacked vertically in a column alongside the main window. The only issue I'd have with using this is that I already display a directory tree at the left of said window, so it might look confusing.
Another alternative I can think of would perhaps not be very accessible, but basically each "tab" would be a sort of bubble that goes into a panel which resizes both vertically and horizontally, and the layout optimize the positions of the "tabs" for space (like a jigsaw).
I dunno, I'm just really open minded to some fresh ideas on this since I know why I've found tab bars in similar apps to be a nuisance.
I'm trying to gain the benefits of quick browsing/navigation between open documents, and space-optimization at the same time.
(This app is a text editor/IDE)