Move to next tab stack with keyboard

cat83293

How can I go from one tab stack to the next tab stack with the keyboard? If I have different tab stacks for different jobs, then I want to jump between the stacks as I move between the jobs, but without using the mouse to select them.

I know I can jump directly to the first 9 (or is it 10) tabs with CTRL-1, CTRL-2, and so on. But this breaks down when you get beyond 4 or 5 tabs for me, since I have to stop and count to know if a tab is number 7, 8 or 9. It's not obvious at a glance.

Consider this common situation for me. I do a new search, so search results open in a new tab, and this is the right most tab, often tab number 15 or above. I open 4 results. If auto grouped then I have a tab stack at position 15, related to a question I am working on in tab 4.

Even if I move the search tab stack to be next to the tab where I am working (CTRL+SHIFT+PageUp / CTRL+SHIFT+PageDown) how do I move quickly and easily between the search results and the tab where I am working with the keyboard?

Next and previous tab are not what I am looking for. I will dig through search results, and then move to try different results on the "working here" tab.

Once I have 2 or 3 tab stacks, moving through the tabs one at a time with the keyboard just becomes a mess.

Next and previous tab by order - no idea what this is supposed to do. I would expect it to move to the next tab going Right or Left (Up or Down), but instead it jumps between tab groups, apparently at random. So going Right can easily take me back to tab group 1, when I was sitting on tab 4, and expected to go to tab 5.

The result, I never stack tabs, since it's the only way I can have predictable movement through my tabs with the keyboard.

Pesala

@cat83293 This existing feature request is similar:

Shortcuts to Tab-stacks / Tab

I think this request is actually better than the linked one, as some users open a lot of tab-stacks and may exceed the limit for assigning shortcuts to each one. It's also easier to remember one pair of shortcuts, such as Ctrl+Tab to cycle tabs and Ctrl+Alt+Tab to cycle tab-stacks.

zendo9

I was looking for this feature as well. When working I do not enjoy using a mouse, so Tab Stack Navigation shortcut would help a lot.

MarsjaninTK

Bump! Pretty good idea. I looked for this just when another line od tabs appeared and gave me other look on the tab stacks idea. My point is to have one pair of shortcuts (e.g. ctrl+pgup/pgdn) to switch around between tabs but only within current stack, and another pair of shortcuts (e.g. ctrl+shift+pgup/pgdn) to switch around between stacks.

speakertomeat

Since my requests seem to be duplicates of this one, I enter my idea in this one instead.

First, there should be a configurable shortcut to move to next and previous stack (by order) like there is for tabs, a good default is eiter ctrl+alt+pgup/pgdown, or alt+pgup/pgdown as it's similar to the existing ctrl+pgup/pgdown for changing to next/previous tab.

Second, I think there should be an option in tabs that togles cycling (which affects both ctrl+scroll if active, and ctrl+pgup/pgdown) to grouped by tabs, so scrolling or shortcutting to previous/next tab (by order) respects the in-tab-stack ordering so we don't jump around tab stacks "at random". Making this an option, people who like the current behaviour can keep it.

mohamadeen

This definitely should be a thing! I don't know how the shortcut situation is such a mess right now with the Tab Stack being a main feature of Vivaldi!

authvin

I was looking for something like this in the settings and couldn't find anything. Would really like at least a shortcut for "move to next tabstack" and "move to previous tabstack", probably both in a "most recently used" and a "tab stack cycler" way. I prefer the latter, but others would probably want the former.

Pesala

@authvin I use Accordion style Tab Stacks with Auto-Expand enabled, and I have assigned single-key shortcuts to Switch to Tab commands:

Switch to Tab 1
Switch to Tab 2
Switch to Tab 3, etc.

Testing with:

Tab 1 pinned
Tab 2 Vivaldi tab
Tabs 3&4 my website stack
Tabs 5-7 BBC website stack

Shortcut 1 activates the pinned tab
Shortcut 2 activates the Vivaldi tab
Shortcut 3 activates the last used tab on my website
Shortcut 4 activates the last used tab on the BBC website

So, in brief, this feature request is already available, except that regular and pinned tabs are not differentiated from stacked tabs.

authvin

@Pesala Thank you for the reply! That is a solution when you only have a few tab stacks, but I often end up with many more than 4-5, which is the limit for where I feel numbered shortcuts are sufficient. It also requires that I remember which index each tab stack has, which is far less than ideal.

I don't think differentiating regular and pinned tabs from stacked tabs is important, the important part for me is to be able to skip past a tab stack when cycling through tabs. If I need to get from tab stack 10 to tab stack 12, and tab stack 11 has 16 tabs in it, it can get quite bothersome

Pesala

@authvin Yes, opening too many tabs is far from ideal.

I have lost count of how many problems were reported by users opening way too many tabs. The tab options are already very complex, making it a nightmare to provide support, as we never know which options users have selected, or what their workflow is like. Adding yet more options will just make matters worse, IMO.

Each new feature, e.g. the long-awaited horizontal scrolling tabs, led to a whole new set of feature requests about scrolling speed, tab width, etc. No doubt implementing tree-style tabs will have similar results.

For me, with two tabs in each of two windows, and rarely more than five tabs, I face no issues with dragging tabs, memory use, finding tabs, or tab previews popping up and obscuring the interface.

Note that after several years, neither of these requests have more than twenty votes, so will probably not be implemented in the foreseeable future. Look for workarounds, e.g. use sessions to save tab sets that you are not actively using.

shifte

My ideal feature is the "Hit-a-Hint-Tabs".

TheHighHorse

I still think this is a worthwhile feature and it has my vote.

Pesala

@Pesala said in Move to next tab stack with keyboard:

So, in brief, this feature request is already available, except that regular and pinned tabs are not differentiated from stacked tabs.

Switch to Next Tab or Stack.png

s0hughes

"way too many tabs" ?
How about (26) separate profiles, some I keep clean with less than ten tabs, but some, very rarely have less than 100 tabs. Today I'm over 200.
Sorry if that offends some, but I'd say a quarter are recent (less than a week old) searches that I've failed to discard, but 3/4 are research I've started and wish to return to. A couple times a month I go through and delete dozens of stacks. I mapped CTRL+Shift+W to close-tab-stack.
NOW, if I could just surf between my tab-stacks more quickly it would save me a ton of time.
This seems like a simple request and it seems clear a good number of us will use it.

Pesala

@s0hughes said in Move to next tab stack with keyboard:

it seems clear a good number of us will use it.

22 votes in over four years is not a good number.

The linked request has just 20 votes in over five years.

I do not think it is a simple request. If you have dozens of tab stacks, how will you remember which of dozens of shortcuts jumps to which stack? Next/previous stack would be easy to remember, but then you have to press the shortcut multiple times.

Maybe the Windows Panel is a better way of managing large numbers of tabs, stacks, and workspaces?

s0hughes

Pretty sure those of us interested would be perfectly satisfied with next stack / previous stack: same as CTRL+PgUp / CTRL+PgDn , cycling in tab order, but jumping one stack at a time, giving focus to 1st (or last... no mater to me) tab in the stack.

Most common use is: I know I have a tab open for this, just found it a couple day ago, should be able to ctrl+pgup a few times and find it, and indeed if we could for example shift+ctrl+pgup and move a stack at a time, we would get there very quickly.

Today, when I go about cleaning up, I might have to change the setting for Close Tab that tells it to focus next or previous, depending whether I begin cleaning from the 1st or last tab. (I change this setting often) Next, I open 1st tab repeat CTRL+PgDn, doing Ctrl+W or shift+ctrl+W (close entire stack) for those I wish to close.
Note that when I get to a stack I do not want to close, I will have to ctrl+pgdn a dozen or more times in order to advance to the next stack. THIS is the pain point we're trying to relieve.
Valid Alternative: Sometimes using the Windows Pane might make this easier, but only if the tab names are descriptive enough, I kind of prefer to see the actual page before deciding to delete the tab.

Pesala

@s0hughes Moving tab stacks to workspaces may help. One can assign shortcuts for up to nine workspaces.

Switch to Workspace Shortcuts.png

s0hughes

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll use the Window panel. Thought this was as simple of skipping forward a chapter vs a page, but I don't know the code. I've tried using workspaces in a couple of profiles, I still forget they are there (where's my tabs?), have to spend time deciding on categories, then often as not, fail to switch to the appropriate workspace before beginning a new search. I already use Profiles (broadly) to segregate I.T.work from home-projects from recreation, but within each would be dozens of sub-categories. Not worth the time to create and maintain.

zecuse

@Pesala said in Move to next tab stack with keyboard:

@s0hughes Moving tab stacks to workspaces may help. One can assign shortcuts for up to nine workspaces.

This doesn't address the fundamental problem, though, for those that already made use of workspaces to help organize their tabs and tab stacks. For those that don't keep too many tabs, this essentially just makes workspaces into glorified tab stacks.

I currently have 6 workspaces and the largest of which has a normal tab + 4 tab stacks. Switching between the search stack and documentation stack in this workspace (computer programming) would be very helpful, even if it's the same result as the "tab cycler back/forward" that's already available to normal tabs.