I’d like to propose an additional concept to @LudvikKoutny’s original proposal: The footer.
Of course, footer is the opposite of the header. It is located at the bottom of the editor.
The underlying principles stays the same:
- No tool properties at the header, properties editor. Only at the sidebar
- Sidebar with only tool properties applies equally to all editor types, such as UV editor, shader editor, image editor, etc.
This additional proposal comes out from this simple question: If the bottom part of the editor is empty and the right part(the problematic sidebar) is so crowded as described in this sidebar panel design thread, why not make use of the bottom part as a footer? It perfectly makes sense with the new concept called popover newly introduced in 2.80.
This UI is really simple, too. Even more than the current one.
- Tool related things are at the left and right
- Menus are at the top and bottom.
Also this footer thing is not something brand new that came out of nowhere. You can see that text editor already has a footer. The name of this thing is actually footer, if you right click on it.
This Exclusive sidebar tool properties + Extra footer menus might also be applied equally to all editor types.
In real-life scenarios and workflows:
- While modeling or sculpting or painting, tool settings will be on the right sidebar. Pressing N key, this sidebar will hide and reveal really easily. Hide it if you want a bigger view, show it if you want to tweak tool options.
- When installing many add-ons as many as 10 or so, the footer will still be able to handle them. It will be able to show all add-on names because it’s long horizontally. Also, no vertical text.
- Sidebar can show way more tool options than the header. Easy on the eye.
P.S. Here are the reasons why header + properties editor tool settings should be removed:
- Header tool settings makes header 2-lined, which is not so ideal.
- Header tool settings cannot show all the sliders and buttons if the tool has many options.
- Properties editor tool settings is confusing because it is unclear if you have multiple editors with multiple active tools at the same time. This is also why the top bar was removed in 2.80 beta stage.
- Current 3 duplicated tool settings UI is toxic for both users and add-on developers. Add-on developers using the tool system has to deal with 3 different Python APIs and UIs.