When using multiple windows, mode indicators currently just disappear when their windows are inactive

[7ombie]

I've mentioned this issue before (#9876), but I also suggested a solution (which was rejected), leading to the entire issue being closed.

This is the just issue.

[kirawi]

This was mentioned in the comment I think:

modes do not exist per view and are global. This is intentional, it was different in the past and caused significant problems/bugs.

View is roughly equivalent to a buffer IIRC

[7ombie]

I understand that modes are global, but the mode-indicator is per-window, and the indicator currently acts as though modes are per-window. The indicator disappears when its window loses focus.

It's not the modes (nor their global nature) that's the problem. It's the mode indicator, as a UI element.

[7ombie]

I understand that modes are global...

To be fair, I should have said that I now understand that modes are global. I didn't really appreciate that when I opened #9876 (which was correctly rejected).

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Thinking about this some more, the issue with the mode indicators seems to stem from the fact that the statusline is per-window, while the mode is global and the bufferline is (similarly) unified.

There's obviously a lot of benefit in retaining all of the current information about the buffers, available (as it is now) per-window (and this can only go in the statusline). However, the statusline could still be defined in terms of the overall state, without changing it very much in practice.

The main difference would be that the statusline would start with a single, unified mode indicator, followed by the information for each of the currently visible buffers, with each buffer's information spaced to left-align with the corresponding buffer above.

Note: Due to the mode indicator, the leftmost window would have the same amount of space (and information) as it does now, and any other windows would have half a dozen or more extra spaces (and no more information). The mode indicators are merged into one, and everything else slides left to realign.

Styles bound to ui.statusline and ui.statusline.inactive in the current themes could be reused to distinguish active-buffer-info from inactive-buffer-info (across the unified statusline).

[7ombie]

You could even move the mode indicator to the bufferline (either top-left, immediately before the buffer-names, or top-right, on its own, at the very end of the bufferline), so the statusline always looks the same for each window.

[kirawi]

To be clear, closing issues is about maintaining an organized tracker rather than shutting the door on further conversation. We've had several closed issues where conversation continued for a while, and some that were reopened.

[7ombie]

@kirawi - No worries. Do you think I should close this issue? I'm happy to, if it helps.

[7ombie]

If we agree that the issue with the mode indicators stems from the fact that the statusline is per-window, and that this is worth trying to fix, the effect on the existing APIs (configuration and theming) would need considering quiet deeply. I think it could plausibly be achieved without breaking anything, but you'd have to carefully repurpose parts of the existing APIs to make it work.

If you want to move this to a discussion, maybe that'd be better?? Whatever's best.