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In KDE 3 there were buttons for hiding the panel. There was an arrow on the right and one on the left, if you clicked on one the panel was hidden. I would like to have a feature like this in KDE 4.

I am pretty sure the plasma devs decided not to do this. Although I suppose a new panel containment could have it. Or the panel could have the feature integrated, but you would have to add a widget to use it.

it wouldn\'t work in the containment; at least not very cleanly. technically you could force it to work (mostly, anyways) but it would be a complete farce and the results would be poor.

it would need to exist in the PanelView itself.

the issue is configuration; i suppose we could add a "Manual Hiding" option in the More Settings area .. it still looks a bit ugly when the panel isn\'t at a screen edge. i personally don\'t see the utility advantage over just autohiding.

Why don\'t add possibility to change mode of all plasmoids to icon? Panels too. We can using panels as drawer or simple hide it. We can add plasmoid to hide desktop containment too. If we do this, selection of containment type and current activity should appear.

There is a plasma widget that does something like that. It is called Toggle Panel.
I have it installed but i can\'t seem to find the the place i have downloaded it from.

@MirzaD
This widget is in playground. You select the panel in the settings and then you can toogle them.
But it's in playground...

aseigo wrote:the issue is configuration; i suppose we could add a "Manual Hiding" option in the More Settings area

What about having a widget that you would add that would trigger it? Either a normal widget added through the normal interface or something more like the splitter which is part of the panel config bar?

"i personally don't see the utility advantage over just autohiding."
Suppose you have a notebook. When you are unplugged you want to see the powerdevil plasmoid all the time: you want your panel "fixed" showing that info, but when you are plugged this plasmoid is usseless so you want the panel hidden.
For this really common user case autohide is not the best option, but "hide on demand" it is.

RGB wrote:"i personally don't see the utility advantage over just autohiding."
Suppose you have a notebook. When you are unplugged you want to see the powerdevil plasmoid all the time: you want your panel "fixed" showing that info, but when you are plugged this plasmoid is usseless so you want the panel hidden.
For this really common user case autohide is not the best option, but "hide on demand" it is.

here is another example how it could be useful:
i have a vertical panel on the right where i keep some rarely used plasmoids like pastebin, toggle compositing ect...
sometimes when i move my mouse to scroll bar on the left i accidentally trigger panel to show it self and it becomes annoying.
Having a on/off switch for showing that panel could be useful, to show/hide panel only when i need it.

It would also be useful for panels between two screens, since you wouldn't be able to accidentally activate it by moving the mouse between the screens.

I personally find autohiding annoying. The missing hide buttons are just another of the reasons I wish I could stick with KDE 3.

I think this can be done with an "autohide switch": When the panel is hidden and you move the mouse pointer to where the hidden panel is, a small switch appears allowing you to un-hide the panel: an elegant but tiny, transparent rectangle with an arrow on it, for example. With the panel visible, when you move the mouse pointer near one edge of the panel, the small button pops up again, now with a down arrow.
IMO, this small button will be less disturbing than the whole panel popping every time I move the mouse near the edge of the desktop, while it gives the desired functionality and a good looking effect.

RGB wrote:I think this can be done with an "autohide switch": When the panel is hidden and you move the mouse pointer to where the hidden panel is, a small switch appears allowing you to un-hide the panel: an elegant but tiny, transparent rectangle with an arrow on it, for example. With the panel visible, when you move the mouse pointer near one edge of the panel, the small button pops up again, now with a down arrow.
IMO, this small button will be less disturbing than the whole panel popping every time I move the mouse near the edge of the desktop, while it gives the desired functionality and a good looking effect.

Thanks for inspiration! What about hide/unhide panels button in cashew? Alternatively we can provide hide/unhide button for each panel in cashew.

This behaviour looks like:
1) User hide <panel>(in cashew)
2) User click unhide <panel>(in cashew)
3) The panel wait for user focus and disappear for some small amount of time
4) User might be able to click on blank space in panel twice to prevent hiding.
5) User might be able to click twice on unhide panel button to prevent hiding.

Some think like that.

Please, add additional mouse usability. Create shortcut to open cashew. This allow users to select panel from keyboard and navigate in it.

In my idea (brainstorm.php?mode=idea&i=82365#anchormain), which is a duplicate of this one, I added screenshots of the android menu : this is (in my opinion) a good implementation of that kind of panel.

I would prefer to have hide/show buttons rather than only a hide button -> the show button should be visible when the panel is hidden.

@aseigo ("i personally don't see the utility advantage over just autohiding"): autohiding is too annoying in my opinion, because you can activate it by error when moving the mouse. Especially if like my you would like to put a big secondary panel on top of the screen : if you want to close a window or access a menu, there is a high probability you will activate the panel. It's even worse when using the touchpad on my netbook.
At the opposite, if you have to click on a button to display the panel, it's give a feeling of stability and doesn't come in the way.