Option to disable speed dial?

[aFantasia]

My flow works around the address bar and my bookmarks. I'm glad I can already clear away the speed-dial from the new-page and just have it blank (I dislike clutter), however with 3.8 the Add Bookmark modal now has some clutter in the distinction between bookmarks and speed-dial. I don't hate the new modal, and the auto-add was sorely needed, though I don't see why we needed the new design (especially one that lost the screenshot).

Personally, having the option to flat-out remove the speed-dial (and thus if I install to a new machine it won't attempt to auto-populate) would be great. It would also mean tab-navigating to the search box would be quicker (since you don't have to tab over the bookmarks and speed-dial buttons just to get to the search).

The freed up vertical space could allow for the snapshot to be re-introduced, since I miss that now, it was nice, or could be used extending the view of the bookmarks tree so that I have more than 6 items at once; the freed vertical space would easily let you get an extra three rows in.

But the true upside of disabling speed-dial would then be not having more interruptions in the future when a new feature gets added to speed dials. I do not care for the feature, it makes no sense to me (just a second, shallower bookmark tree, I already put frequently-used bookmarks high up in mine anyway) and so while 3.8 is what made me finally just want it gone (did we really have to give up the snapshot for this?) it'll be useful for future-proofing my options, and at the end of the day is more power for the community and just another customisation option for an excellently customisable browser.

[Pesala]

@aFantasia Right-click in the bookmarks panel on the speed dial offers the option to remove the speed dial folder from the start page.

However, as you say, it still appears in the Add Bookmark dialog.

I do not understand the need for this at all. The Bookmarks tab on the dialog includes the Speed Dial folder.

[luetage]

@aFantasia Ideally speed dials wouldn’t show in the bookmarks dialog when you have no speed dial assigned, but you can hide this with CSS right now if you want to.

.BookmarkLocationSelector-ToggleButtonGroup-Button:nth-of-type(2) {display: none;}

[aFantasia]

@Pesala As I mentioned, I've already cleared my start page/new page so I'm happy there. Though whenever I go to a new machine, because speed dial is there by default it "synchronises" when I log in and so now it's added in speed dial again.

So flat out removing it so it won't do this or anything in the future (people do love suggesting new speed dial features and I cannot bring myself to care) is the more sure-fire solution for my flow.

And my thoughts exactly, previously it was the Bookmarks and Speed Dial at the top level; and it actually is a holdover still, since the new dialog just has a single top-level folder that is Bookmarks itself, which is rather redundant. So I don't know why they felt the need to split it up into an extra UI element I need to tab through (kb navigation matters people! It's a major accessibility requirement!) and takes up a lot of vertical space (while adding questionably little, since a top-level folder would mean you search both at once).

[Ayespy]

@aFantasia If you go to a new machine, delete all the bookmarks before you sync.

Speed Dial is not a discrete entity. It's just a folder with bookmarks in it. Vivaldi's marketing agreements with various partners require them to populate that folder with links to the partners. If you don't like them, delete the folder and then sync.

[aFantasia]

@Ayespy This is what I do. It's just an extra step that I wish I didn't have to (one of the points of sync is to make setup on new machines seamless). I know Speed Dial is just a top-level folder (it's part of why the Bookmark vs Speed Dial selector in the new modal makes no sense to me, just seems redundant).

If Speed Dial could be synced separately, that would solve it (just by recognising the top-level folder as the special case it is, because that's how all these other UI elements recognise it to work like this).

Since that's unlikely to change, a flat-out "Disable Speed Dial" tickbox that just blocked the folder would be my preferred approach.

I'm okay with the marketing agreements, but I've seen them already and deleted them already. I just want to get up-and-running and probably have other things to think about, so something like this that pollutes my other machines is just annoying, hence the feature request.

Is it major? No. Can you avoid needing it? Yes. Can we also get the computer to do tedious busywork to make our lives even just a little bit better when we need it? Yes. Should we? If it's not too much hassle, hence the request.

[Ayespy]

@aFantasia I take an interesting approach. My TOP level is not named Bookmarks, but rather Speed Dial. It populates my start page, my bookmarks bar, and my panel. Since I know every brand new Vivaldi comes with bookmarks, I simply get rid of them before I sync. As ANY folder can be assigned to the bookmarks bar or to show in Speed Dial (I have six speed dial folders assigned) it's not practical to "disable Speed Dial," since that would disable the (integral) Start Page function, and any folder can be a Speed Dial.

[aFantasia]

@Ayespy Can't say I see how it's "not practical". If you want your top level to only consist of the Speed Dial, then power to you. But I don't use anything that's distinctly "Speed Dial", and my start page and new page are blank because that's just what I prefer. Seems to work perfectly well displaying nothing.

In the interests of Vivaldi being the nice and customisable browser it is, and so adapting to your personal flow, something like this has value for people that use the bookmarks like the old-fashioned people we are.

Wanting to say "No speed dial for me" and have Vivaldi understand that feels sensible to me, same way I can say "don't want to see a history panel". Perhaps I just prefer to use CTRL/CMD+H and open the history as a full page. And why not? It has some very pretty graphics. Here, I just want to be able to say no to speed dial at a global level (since it's a pretty global feature), and so corresponding UI elements disappear along with.

In the case of the bookmark modal, the separation between Bookmarks and Speed Dial is just bizarre to me, since they are just top-level folders, and if you are the kind of person that only has one top-level folder (like Speed Dial as you do) then it'd be nice if that's all it showed for them.

And again, "simply get rid of them before I sync" is just tedium, and so trivial that it feels ripe for automation. If you enjoy removing them every time, go for it. Personally, I don't. Speed Dial is treated as a special case, even though it's just another top-level folder. That's fine. It's just not a special case I use. You do, glad you have your flow. It's just not for me, and I don't need preaching on how you can set things up so that it collapses into "The One Speed Dial to Rule Them All" when I'd rather just have dead-simple bookmarks.

My flow is something I'm comfortable with and doesn't need changing, so when something comes along and makes things more awkward, and that awkwardness could be solved by simply giving more options, more customisation, then not only does it seem practical, but quite beneficial.

[Ayespy]

@aFantasia Except, Speed Dial is not "another top level folder." It is any folder at all, that may have anything or nothing in it. It's not a specific folder at a specific level. There are plenty of options to not use it, but as "startpage" is integrated into more than one aspect of the browser, it is not trivial to turn off that function, and as long as the function is there, the necessity to be able to assign a folder of bookmarks to it remains.

And lots and lots of people like to use it.

And, of course, for Vivaldi to have income and pay its staff, it needs to populate the folder that is assigned to startpage in every new installation.

So what you're asking is certainly not impossible, but it strikes me as unlikely, because unlike certain toolbars that can simply be hidden or "turned off," it's a bit too widely integrated. That said, lets see how many users vote for your request.