Seems like a good idea, particularly for users on smaller screens. Tomorrow’s daily build will have a “Docked tool layout” preference in the Window category, which can either be “full width” (current behavior) or “full height” (your suggested behavior). The default behavior is still “full width”. It wasn’t clear whether it’s more useful to have the additional vertical space for docked tools or being able to see more of the toolbar icons without resorting to a rollover menu, so we left the default behavior as is.

I thought I’d cover a few things to help get more mileage out of a crowded docked tool area. It’s possible you’re aware of these already but maybe not everyone on the list is:

(1) You can drag on the title bar of a docked tool to make into an undocked “floating” window. You have to drag it outside the toolbar area so that it doesn’t just immediately re-dock. You could even dock it into the other side of the ChimeraX window, though that would typically make the graphics window pretty narrow.

(2) You can drag a tool on top of another tool and then they will share the same space with tabs on the bottom to toggle between them. You can do this with multiple tools, not just two.

(3) You can drag on the line between the bottom of one tool and the top of the next to allocate more space to one tool or the other.

--Eric

Eric Pettersen

UCSF Computer Graphics Lab

On Oct 22, 2026, at 11:25 AM, Roch, Filip A via ChimeraX-users <chimerax-users@cgl.ucsf.edu> wrote:

Dear ChimeraX team,

I have a suggestion regarding the Tools side panel.

Many users that I know struggle with the lack of vertical space in the side panel. I think a feasible fix would be to give users an option to have the side panel extend all the way to the top, with the top tool panel ending earlier (like in the mockup pic 2 vs pic 1). Chimera can already “trim” the top panel if the window is too small (pic 3), so I think it might be possible to implement my suggestion. You could increase the vertical space even more if you'd allow the bottom two bars (command line and the line that shows chain information) to also end where the side panel starts (also pic 2).

Please let me know if I can help in any way.

Many thanks,

Filip Roch

Imperial College London

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