Offer "toggle-views" with four shortcuts

[ralf3u]

I think it would be good to offer users next to switch-views also toggle-views. The switch-views are more a kind of playground for developers while toggle-views would be for normal users.

Programming of toggle-views
The switch-views can be used as base. Then reduce switch-views to those three shortcuts:

• toggle-editor-1.lua
• toggle-sidebar-1.lua
• switch-views-(editor-↔-sidebar).lua

Then change the name of the shortcuts (see down below in Name of the shortcuts) and add three conditions (see down below in Condition of the shortcuts).

Name of the shortcuts
Toggle between only editor and editor&sidebar
Toggle between editor&sidebar and only sidebar
Toggle between only editor and only sidebar

Condition of the shortcuts

1. Toggle between only editor and editor&sidebar
   If only sidebar is visible do nothing.
   In other words: If only editor or editor&sidebar are shown, then do ...
2. Toggle between editor&sidebar and only sidebar
   If only editor is visible do nothing.
   In other words: If editor&sidebar or only sidebar are shown, then do ...
3. Toggle between only editor and only sidebar
   If editor&sidebar is visible do nothing.
   In other words: If only editor or only sidebar are shown, then do ...

Content of the document hotkeys.cfg

Toggle-between-only-editor-and-editor&sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-editor&sidebar-and-only-sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-only-editor-and-only-sidebar.lua

Document init.lua
Instead of sidebar_start = "show": sidebar_start = "hide".
Reasons:
The most people use Geany also for other formats, like TXT-documents. I made the experience that auto-sidebar is not good for me when using the shortcuts of switch-views.

History
This issue is based on the knowledge of xiota/geany-tab-style#2 (comment).

[ralf3u]

Would it be possible to offer toggle-views on xiota/geanylua-scripts in the next days or weeks by using switch-views as base for programing toggle-views as it is described in this issue (see also Condition of the shortcuts of the report), so I can test right away toggle-views?

The script toggle-views is exactly what I'm missing so much in the plugin Preview.

[ralf3u]

In the report of this issue, those are the shortcuts names:

Toggle-between-only-editor-and-editor&sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-editor&sidebar-and-only-sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-only-editor-and-only-sidebar.lua

To the second and third shortcut
I feel 100% sure with them names and them functionality.

To the first shortcut
Since this morning, I'm hesitating about name and functionality.
a)
The Geany shortcut Toggle Sidebar does not work correctly – when pressing Toggle between only editor and only sidebar and if only sidebar is visible, then, when pressing the Geany shortcut Toggle Sidebar, an empty tab appears I think so. So, a replacement could be interesting to avoid this artifact.
b)
My idea was to use an other shortcut name that is doing a little bit something else than the Geany shortcut to have a clear separation between both shortcuts.
c)
The main reason why I would like to change the name and functionality of the first shortcut today: The names of the second and third shortcut are long. It is necessary because a shortcut name should explain exactly what it is doing. By doing this there will be no misunderstanding. Three long names are too much. The most important shortcuts are the second and the third shortcuts. So, the idea is to use Toggle Sidebar as name without condition to give the second and third shortcut names more importance. One more advantage would be that users know what Toggle Sidebar is doing, so that they don't need to learn something new.

So, these are the new shortcut names:

Toggle-Sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-editor&sidebar-and-only-sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-only-editor-and-only-sidebar.lua

And these are the conditions:
Second shortcut: If only editor is visible do nothing.
Third shortcut: If editor&sidebar is visible do nothing.

[ralf3u]

The best would be to offer four shortcuts:

Toggle-sidebar.lua
Toggle-sidebar-and-focus.lua
Toggle-between-editor&sidebar-and-only-sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-only-editor-and-only-sidebar.lua

Conditions:
Third shortcut: If only editor is visible do nothing.
Fourth shortcut: If editor&sidebar is visible do nothing.

[ralf3u]

I recognized that for the shortcut Toggle sidebar there should be an important condition:
IF the width of the sidebar is 100%, THEN set focus on the content area of the sidebar.

So, these are the shortcuts:

Toggle-sidebar.lua
Toggle-sidebar-and-focus.lua
Toggle-between-editor&sidebar-and-only-sidebar.lua
Toggle-between-only-editor-and-only-sidebar.lua

And these are the important conditions:

First shortcut: IF the width of the sidebar is 100%, THEN set focus on the content area of the sidebar.
Third shortcut: If only editor is visible do nothing.
Fourth shortcut: If editor&sidebar is visible do nothing.

[ralf3u]

Sorry, but I didn't find the time to install Garuda Linux Xfce edition in the last weeks. Today I installed Lubuntu 25.10. Lubuntu 25.10 is using Geany 2.1. So, now I would be ready for testing toggle-views.

Step-by-step programing
If you program toggle-views, maybe it would be better to program first only one shortcut, the fourth shortcut (see my last comment). Then I would test it and test if the artifact is still there (empty tab, when the shortcut was pressed and only sidebar is visible, and then when pressing the Geany shortcut Toggle Sidebar).
After this the other three shortcuts could be programed. Then I would test all shortcuts.
After this maybe it would be good to add the auto-sidebar functionality because if the auto-sidebar functionality does not work correctly, then it would better to not offer the auto-sidebar functionality to toggle-views.

[ralf3u]

After this maybe it would be good to add the auto-sidebar functionality because if the auto-sidebar functionality does not work correctly, then it would better to not offer the auto-sidebar functionality to toggle-views.

Maybe it would be better to offer two versions:
toggle-views-without-option_auto-sidebar and toggle-views-with-option_auto-sidebar.

[ralf3u]

Will you program toggle-views in the next time?

I could test the focus issue in switch-views, but the thing with switch-views is that there were too many problems like the focus issue, some other issues (see issue number 14, 15 and 18), and auto-sidebar issue I think so.

That was the reason why last month I suggested to start programming toggle-views with only the shortcut Toggle between only editor and only sidebar (see Step-by-step programing of my comment above #16 (comment)).